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BUILDERS OF CAf^ADA 



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http://www.arcliive.org/details/giantsofdominionOOmarq 



Giants <t Dominion 



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AGXES MUTE MACHAK. LOUIS HOXOKE' 
FKECHETTE. J. CASTELL HOrKIXS. DAVID 
CKEIGHTON. WILLIAM BUCKINGHAM, F. KLAKE 
CROFTON. J. LAMBERT PAYNE. AND OTHERS 




-EDITED BY 



T. G. MAROUIS 



AUTHOR OF- 



" Stories of New France."' " Stories from Canadian Histor>-,'' " Mar^erlte 
de Roberval." " Canada's Sons on Korjeand Veldt," " Life of Earl Roberts. 
"Presidents of ttie L"n:ted States, from Pierce to McKinley." 

Embellished vitli Many Appropriate Engraving! 






' l.lllJR(ARYof .infilQBESS 



OCT 28 ayub 

fiUPX s. 

A-- I Hill mill IW^ iB 



Ent«rod nccordirxfi to Act of 
Congress. IH03 e>.r>d 1905 by 
W . E. SCULL, In <h>f» office of 
IKo Librarian of Coriftress. ftt 
WasKiiAtJton, D. C. 

Ail RlsKls RoKorvotl 






V^_ 






PREFACE. 

N attempting to give an account of the Buiklois of Canada it has been 
found impossible to include the names of all the prominent men who 
have figured on the stage of history in New France and in British North 
America. In the case of such a prominent soldier as Montcalm, so much of 
his life is woven into the story of Wolfe that it was deemed unnecessary to 
devote a separate sketch to him. Again, in dealing with the men of a more 
recent age, it was thought best to consider only those men who have played 
their part in the history of the Dominion as a whole and, therefore, such 
prominent Canadians as Principal Grant, Sir Daniel Wilson, Sir William 
Dawson and others have been omitted. It was deemed wise to include all 
the Premiers of the Dominion, for, although several of them were men of 
comparatively slight importance, their position and the questions that were 
associated with their names make them, as it were, national figures. 

The studies of the early part will be found to fully present the Romance 
of Canadian History, and the writers in dealing with the French period of 
our history, have, as far as possible, kept to the fore the picturesque in the 
lives under consideration. 

In treating more recent history, as some of the men studied are still 
living and many of them are personally remembered by living Canadians, it 
was thought wise, whenever possible, to give extracts, at some length, from 
their letters or diaries or speeches that would let them reveal themselves. 

The authors of this volume are all experienced writers, and in every 
case in sympathy with the subjects that they treat. Agnes Maule Machar, 
the author of several of the sketches, has for many years been an ardent 
student of the early history of Canada, and has made an exhaustive study of 
the lives of such men as Champlain and La Salle. The writers of the lives 

▼II 



yjH PRSFACS. 

of the more recent Builders of Canada will be found to be men who have been 
intimately associated, either personally or in a public way, with the careers of 
the subjects of their sketches. In the case of the study of the E,t.-Hon. Sir 
Wilfrid Laurier, the greatest of living Canadian statesmen, the publishers 
have been fortunate enough to secure a sympathetic and unbiased study from 
the pen of Louis Honor6 Frechette, a great Liberal compatriot and the 
ablest writer French Canada has yet produced. 

The publishers have to thank the Copp Clark Company, of Toronto, for 
kindly permitting them to reproduce several of the sketches which have 
previously appeared in the editor's Stories from Canadian History. 

In every case where the author of the article is not named the sketch 

has been written by the editor. 

THE PUBLISHERS. 



PAGB 



pRKF^nf?. 

I. Jacques Caktter. ....-»• ^ 



18 
50 
56 
70 
99 



II. Samuel De Champlain . . . • 

III. Pere Brebceuf • . e . • • 

IV. Adam Daulac .•..•••* 
V. Robert De La Salle .«**.. 

VI. Count De Frontenac ....•• 

VII. General James Wolfe 128 

VIII. Gut Carleton . . . • • • .159 

IX. John Graves Simcob . . . • • • .174 

X Joseph Brant • • • ^^^ 

XI. General Isaac Brock 204 

XII. Tecumseh . . • • • • • r ^i^ 

XIII. Thomas Chandler Haliburton 220 

XIV. Hon. Joseph Howe ....... 



232 



XV. William Hamilton Merritt 253 



CONTENTS. 

XVI. Bishop Strach^n ....... 263 

XVII. Egerton Ryerson .,.,.... 274 

XVIII. Lord Durham 289 

XIX. Lord Sydenham ........ 302 

XX. Sir John Beverley Robinson ...... 314 

XXI. Lord Elgin 319 

XXII. Sir George Etienne Cartier , - . , . 840 

XXIII. Hon. George Brown . . . . . . , 347 

XXIV. The Right Hon. Sir John A. !iIacdonald. . . 368 
XXV. Hon. Alexander Mackenzie . . , . . . 392 

XXVL Sir J. J. C. Abbott. . . . . . , 419 

XXVII. The Right Hon. Sir John Thomis .n . . . .432 

XXVIII. Sir Mackenzie Bowell ...... 442 

XXIX. Sir Charles Tupper . . . . . ., . 453 

XXX Sir Joseph Hickson. ...... 473 

XXXI. Sir John C. Schultz ....... 476 

XXXII. Lord Strathcona 482 

XXXIII. Sir Wilfrid Laurier ....... 525 

Appendix 

" Our Guests the Colonial Premiers " „ , . . 539 
A Review of Popular Progress . . ". 541-570 



ILLUSTRATIONS 



ILLUSTRATIONS 



PAGE 

The Death of Wolfe Frontispiece 

Jacques Cartier , 1 

Samuel de Champlain 1 

Interesting Scenes in Life of Jacques Cartier 9 

View of St. Malo. Cartier's Manor House. Cartier's ^liips 9 

Old Hudson's Bay Company Post Near Montreal 20 

Francois, Due de Levis, Marshal of France 28 

Lieut. -General J. Graves Simcoe 28 

Champlain's Buildings at Quebec XIV 

Jerome le Royerde la Dauversiere 39 

Paul Chomedey de Maisonneuve 39 

Marguerite Bom-geois 47 

Magdalen de la Peltrie 47 

Chateau de Ramezay, Montreal , . 68 

The Lion. Sir Louis Hypolite Lafontaine, Bart ^^^ 

Quebec in Time of Frontenac VI 

The Building of the "Griffin" . 192 

The Hon. Robert Baldwin, C. B , TH 

Guy Carleton, Lord Dorchester . 85 

Robert de La Salle, Famous Explorer 9o 

Major-General James Wolfe lOo 

Marquis de Montcalm : 105 

Mgr. Jean Octave Plessis IIG 

Fran9ois de Laval de Montmorency llG 

Scene on the Saguenay 125 

Two Historic Relics of Early French Settlement 136 

Old Casemate at Louisbom-g 130 

Old French Magazine at Annapolis 130 

Admiral Saunders 145 

Admiral Boscawen -145 

Wolfe's Monument in Westminster Abbey 156 

Statue to Governor Simcoe 165 

The Battle of Queeustown Heights, October 13, 1813 176 

Two Places of Historic Interest in Quebec 185 

Powder Magazine, Old Fort George , 196 

Butler's Rangers' Barracks . 196 

Major-General Sir Isaac Brock, K. D 205 

The Earl of Durham, G.C.B 20 ) 

Tecinnseh 216 

Thayendanegea (Joseph Brant) 21() 

Major-General Sii* William Pepperell at the Siege of Louisbom-g ._ 230 

Sir Samuel Cunard, Bart 225 

Hon. Joseph Howe 225 

Places of Interest in Old and Ne^ Canada 245 

XV 



XVI ILLUSTflATI02sS. 

PAGE 

Maisouneuve Monument, Montreal 256 

Hon. Wm. Hamilton Merritt 2^b 

William Lyon Mackenzie 265 

Hon. George W. Koss, LL.D 276 

The Rev. Egerton Eyerson, D.D 296 

The Rt. Rev. Dr. John Strachan 296 

The Hon. Sir John Beverley Robinson 285 

Charles Poulett Thomson, First Lord Sydenham 285 

•1 the Annapolis Valley. The Land of " Joe " Howe .' o05 

The Hon. Sir George E. Cartier, Bart., M.F 316 

The Hon. Edward Blake, Q.C., LL.D., M.P 316 

The Hon. George Brown 325 

James Bruce, Earl of Elgin and Kincardine 336 

Hon. R. W. Scott 345 

The Hon. Sir Antoine A. Dorion, Knt 345 

The Hon. Sir Oliver Mowat, G.G.M.G., LL.D 356 

]Monument at Ottawa to Sir John A. Macdonald 365 

The Rt. Hon. Sir John A. Macdonald, G.C.B. 376 

The Hon. Sir Richard J. Cartwright, G.C.M.G 385 

The Hon. Alexander Mackenzie , 396 

Gen. Sir WilUamEenwick Wilhams, Bart, (of Kars) 400 

Major-General Sir Howard Douglas, G.C.B. 400 

Thomas Chandler Haliburton . 405 

Hon. L. S. Huntington 416 

Sir tienri G. Joly de I^otbiniere 416 

The Rt. Hon. Sir J. S. D. Thompson, K. CM. G ' 425 

The Hon. Sir John J. C. Abbott , 425 

The Brant Monument, Brantford . 436 

Battle of Cut Knife Hill, Northwest Rebelhon of 1885 483 

The Hon. Sir Mackenzie Bowell, K.C.M.G 445 

TheHon. SirAdolpheJ. P. R. Caron, K.C.M.G 445 

View of Mount Lefroy in the Rockies 456 

The Hon. Sir Charles Tuj^per 465 

Natural Steps, Montmorenci, near Quebec 472 

The Hon. George E. Foster 478 

George Stephen, First Lord Mount Stephen 502 

Donald A. Smith, Lord Strathcona and Mount Royal 502 

Quebec Citadel 495 

Old Fort Garry near the City of Winnipeg, Manitoba 489 

Sir John Christian Schultz 507 

Louis Riel 508 

TheHon. WilUamMulock, K.C., LL.D., M.P 513 

Sir Wm. C. Van Home 524 

Sir Joseph Llickson 529 

Charles M. Hays 529 

The Departure of Strathcona's Horse for South Africa 535 

The Rt. Hon. Sir Wilfrid J^amier 546 

Rossland, British Columbia, in 1898 555 

Canadian Pacific Steamship Line. The Empress of India 566 



CHAPTER I. 

JACQUES CARTIER. 

By Agnes Maui,e Machar. 

anadian History Begins with Jacques Cartier — The Time of His Birth Uncertain — A Reuown^v, 
Sailor — Sails to Canada in 1534 — His Departure from St. Malo — Reaches Newfoundland — 
His Description of the Country — First Contact with the Indians — Takes Possession of the 
Country for France — Returns to France — Prepares for a Second Voyage — A Stormy Passage 
— Ill Sight of Stadacona (Quebec) — Cartier's Reception by Donnacona — Sails up the River 
to Hochelaga (Montreal) — His Reception at Hochelaga — Back at Stadacona — Winters in 
Canada — Hardships and Scurvy — Sails to Old France Taking a Number of Indians — 
Undertakes a Third Voyage — Fails to Found a Colony — Returns in Disgust to France — 
Honors and Riches His Reward — His Death. 

ANADIAN history properly begins with the name of Jacques Cartier, 

for, though he made no permanent settlement in this country, the 

accounts of his famous voyages and of his efforts to found a colony 

on the banks of the St. Lawrence did much to draw future discoverers and 

adventurers to the northern part of the American continent. 

Of the life of this great sailor but little is known. Even the date of his 
birth is mere conjecture. The date usually given is December 31, 1494 ; but 
it is much more probable that he was born in the year 1491, between June 7 
and December 23. 

Before attempting his first celebrated voyage of discovery to Canada he 
was already a noted mariner, having made, it is stated, no fewer than three 
voyages to Newfoundland. It is likewise supposed that he had seen service 
with the Portuguese government, and that, in the year 1527, he visited Brazil, 
but of the period of his life before 1534 little or nothing is definitely known. 

Of his voyages to Canada, however, we have several excellent accounts, 
and no man among the early explorers is better known than this celebrated 
mariner of St. Malo. 

The bright spring sunshine lighted up the gray walls and battlements 
of the rugged old sea-port town of St. Malo, on the coast of Brittany, when, 

1 



2 BUILDEES OF CANADA. 

April 20, 1534, two little ships slowly glided away from its harbor bound on 
a long and adventurous voyage. They were manned by a hundred and 
twenty men, and their commander was Jacques Cartier, a captain specially 
chosen by King Francis. The king hoped that he would be able to discover 
the coveted short route to China and Cathay, and possibly to discover the 
gold and silver of which the French had heard in South America. He 
expected, also, that Cartier would open up new channels for trade, and secure 
the possession of part, at least, of the great new continent, to which, as he 
truly said, France had as good a right as Spain and Portugal, who wanted to 
have it all to themselves. 

The little expedition sailed across the wide Atlantic, reaching Cape 
Bonavista in Newfoundland about the middle of May. From thence, passing 
on to the Isle of Birds, as the Portuguese had called it on account of the 
multitude of birds there, they arrived at the Straits of Belle Isle, and after 
some detention through bad weather, they explored the cold and sterile 
shores of Labrador and Newfoundland. 

Cartier thought that this barren and uninviting land might be taken for 
the country assigned to Cain ; and considered one acre of the Magdalen 
Islands, which he reached next, as worth the whole of Newfoundland. He 
had much to tell of the birds he found there, as well as of "beasts as large as 
oxen, and possessing great tusks like elephants," which, when he approached, 
leaped suddenly into the sea. He described, too, the beautiful trees and 
delicious fruits, as well as the wild corn, blossoming peas (vetches), currants, 
strawberries, roses and sweet-smelling herbs. 

Cartier thought the waves were very heavy and strong among these 
is'ands. This made him think that there was probably an opening between 
Newfoundland and Cape Breton, and he began to look for a passage by 
which he might sail westward into the heart of the country. As the sailors 
rowed their boats close in shore, coasting along bays and inlets, they could 
sometimes see the naked savages moving about on the beach, or paddling 
their light birch canoes ; after a time they managed to hold some intercourse 
and traffic with them, by means of signs and little gifts of hatchets, knives, 
beads and toys, often having as many as fifty canoes about them. The 



JACQUES CARTIKR. S 

Indians were delighted to exchange their fish for the knives and hatchets 
which they coveted so much, and a red cap for their chief Bent them away 
overjoyed. 

Cartier tried in vain all the little inlets and rivers opening out of the 
Bay of Chaleuys (heats), to which he gave this name because he found there 
both the weather and the water so warm. Failing to find any passage like 
that by which he had entered the Gulf, he sailed east and northward along 
the coast of Gaspe Bay. Here he landed and . set up a large wooden cross, 
thirty feet high, carved with three fleurs-de-lis, and bearing the inscription in 
French, " Long live the King of France I " By this means he formally took 
possession of the land for the King of France. 

In order to impress the savages the more, the French knelt around the 
cross, and made signs, by pointing to the sky, to show that it was connected 
with the salvation of man. This done, Cartier and his men returned to their 
ships and were visited afterwards by many of the Indians, including the Chief, 
his brother and three sons. The chief showed them by expressive signs 
that he did not like their setting up the cross on his territory without his 
permission, but when they had induced him to enter their ships and look at 
the hatchets and knives that the white men had for trading, Cartier easily 
persuaded him that the cross had been set up merely as a beacon to point the 
way to the harbor. 

Cartier treated the chief hospitably, expressing a great desire to make 
friends with his people, and promising to return, bringing many useful articles 
made of iron to exchange for furs. Two of the chief's sons were persuaded 
to accompany him to France, putting on with great satisfaction the new 
clothes that Cartier gave them, and throwing the old ones to their friends, 
who came out to take leave of them, bringing farewell gifts of fish in their 
canoes. Then with good will expressed on all sides, the French captain 
sailed away, exhorting the Indians to respect the cross he had set up on the 
shore. 

Head winds and storms prevented Cartier from making any further 
discoveries on this voyage. He just missed finding his way into the 
St. Lawrence at Anticosti, supposing, without full examination, that the gulf 



4 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

there was a great bay. When he arrived home in September, his account of 
his adventures was eagerly listened to. The two young Indians he had 
brought with him were objects of great interest to the Bretons, and were 
taught to speak French, so that they might answer the questions which were 
asked on all sides. 

Cartier received great honors for his discoveries, and many people in 
France were most anxious that he should make a second voyage in order to 
extend them. 

In spite of opposition they succeeded in organizing another and a better 
equipped expedition than the first. Extensive preparations were made during 
the winter, and on a bright spring day— May 16, 1535 — all St. IMalo was astir 
to see the great religious ceremonial which celebrated the departure of the 
little fleet. Down in the bay rode at anchor ** La Grande Hermine," a 
large-sized ship for those days, with the two smaller vessels which were to 
complete the flotilla. In these were to go, besides the crews, several 
members of the French noblesse. And in the old cathedral were assembled 
the ofiicers and men to hear mass and to receive absolution and the paternal 
blessing of the bishop on their perilous enterprise ; while the Breton wives, 
mothers and maidens, in their picturesque costumes, looked on in mingled 
pride and anxiety. Three days later the flotilla set sail for the setting sun. 

Scarcely, however, had they lost sight of the Breton cliiTs when the ships 
were scattered by a violent storm. It was July before they were collected at 
the Straits of Belle Isle, from whence they coasted along the bleak shore of 
Labrador till they entered a small bay opposite the Island of Anticosti. It 
was the fSte of St. Lawrence when they entered the gulf, and Cartier bestowed 
that name on the bay, from whence it afterwards extended to the whole Gulf 
and thence to the noble river, then called by Cartier the River of Ilochelaga. 
The St. Lawrence, therefore, keeps in its name a record of the very day when 
Cartier's expedition first floated on its waters, after its long tossing on a 
stormy sea. 

Piloted by the young Indians who had accompanied Cartier to France, 
the French ships sailed up the great unknown river, on which no 
white wings sa^a those of the sea-gulls had ever appeared before. The 



JACQUES CAETIER. 5 

mariners gazed with admiring interest at the grand, sombre, pine-clad 
hills that seemed to guard the approach, and at the gloomy gorge of the dark 
Saguenay, with huge rugged rocks and dense forests. They landed on a 
long, low island which they called the Isk aixx Coudres on account of the 
delicious filberts they found there. 

Passing up what is now called St. Paul's Bay and on under the frowning 
headlands of Cape Tourmente, they dropped anchor at last on the lea of 
" a fair island " crowned with rich woods and festooned with wild vines and 
such abundant clusters of grapes that Cartier gave it the name of the Isle of 
Bacchus. We know it as the beautiful Island of Orleans, whose purple mass 
divides the river below the rock of Quebec. 

According to their young Indian guides, the country they were now 
sailing through was divided into three territories. The first took its name 
from the Saguenay, beginning at Anticosti and ending with the Isle aux 
Coudres. The second extending thence to Hochelaga, the present site of 
Montreal, was called Kanata, a Mohawk w^ord signifying a village or cluster 
of huts. This name, slightly changed into Canada has widened its 
significance, until, reaching from the Atlantic to the Pacific, it includes half 
a continent. The third territory, Hochelaga, was the largest, richest and 
most populous of the three, which of course formed only a small part 
of the country now called Canada. 

As the ships approached the shore and cast anchor, the Indians could 
be seen watching them with great interest and wonder ; though probably 
they had heard rumors before of these strange winged canoes and pale-faced 
visitors. At fii*st they seemed disposed to fly, but Cartier sent ashore his two 
young Indian pilots. Doubtless they had many wonderful stories to tell 
their people — stories which must have seemed to them like tales from 
another world. Very soon curiosity overcame fear, and the redmen's birch 
canoes were seen swarming about the ships, loaded with presents of maize, fruit 
and fish, in return for which Cartier gave them the gifts they prized so much. 

Cartier's two young Indians could now speak French pretty well, and 
acted as interpreters between their countrymen and tuese strange visitors. 
The ' udians eagerly examined the winged canoes, climbed into the rigging, 



O BUILDERS OP CANADA. 

and gazed in astonishment at the faces and clothes of the Frenchmen. Next 
day their old chief Donnacona came in state to visit Cartier, attended by a 
train of twelve canoes, full of Indians in paint and feathers, with tomahawk <' 
and bows and arrows. He left ten of his canoes at a safe distance and 
approaching the ships with the other two he began a long oration, inquiring 
whether the strangers had come for peace or war. With the help of hia 
interpreters, Cartier succeeded in reassuring him, and invited him into his 
cabin, where he regaled him before they parted, the old chief kissing 
Cartier's arm and placing it round his own neck, as the greatest mark of 
respect he could show him. 

Cartier, of course, was eager to press on up the magnificent river which. 
seemed to beckon him to follow its windings. But first he must find a 
convenient harbor for his ships. He sailed on till he reached the mouth of 
a little river flowing into a "goodly and pleasant sound," making a 
sheltered haven at a point which still seems the fitting portal of the fair 
Dominion of Canada. Here the river became a mile-wide strait. On one 
side were the wooded heights of Point Levis ; on the other, rising grand and 
sheer from the river, the great, brown rock of Cape Diamond, thrusting 
rugged scarped clifis through its fringe of stately trees out into the dark river 
below. As the Frenchmen looked up at these rocky ramparts towering above 
the little Indian " village " that clung to their sides, as if for protection, they 
must have felt that here was a natural site for a commanding fortress. And, 
indeed, Quebec was destined, through centuries of struggle to be the key to 
the possession of Canada. 

Cartier moored his ships in the little river, which he called the St. Croix 
— now the St Charles — and Donnacona came with a train of five hundred 
Indians to welcome him. Cartier, in his turn, landed to visit Stadacona, as 
the cluster of wigwams was called. Here the French captain and his friends 
were received with great joy and cordiality by the inhabitants, who wero 
delighted to have the opportunity of a nearer view, and entertained them 
with their Indian songs and dances — the men and boys screeching out 
welcome, and the squaws dancing knee-deej? in the water. Cartier's gifts of 



JACQUES CARTIER. I 

gay-colored beads redoubled their hilarity, and their joyous though discordant 
songs followed the departing French as they rowed out to the ships. 

But Cartier had heard that miles away up the river ky a large Indian 
town called Hochelaga, the capital of a great country Thither he wished to 
proceed, with his two young Indian guides as interpreters But Donnacona 
and the Indians seemed jealous of the strangers going further into their 
country, and tried a curious device for keeping them back. 

One morning the Frenchmen saw, from their ships lying at anchor in 
the St. Croix, a canoe containing three strange figures, clothed in black and 
white dog skins, with black faces and long horns. One of these, gazing 
straight before liim, uttered a long harangue in the Indian tongue, as they 
passed the ships. Then, as they were paddling towards the shore, they all 
fell flat down in the canoe. 

The Indians on shore rushed down, screaming, to their aid, and carried 
them off to the woods, where an earnest debate seemed to follow , after which 
the Indian guides came to the shore, looking so dismayed that Cartier shouted 
to them, asking what was the matter. They replied that their g©d 
Coudouagny had sent to warn the French against ascending the great 
river further, as this would bring them into danger and disaster from storms 
and snow and drifting ice. Cartier only replied — smiling, no doubt, at the 
simple device — that Coudouagny was a fool ; that he could not hurt 
Christians, and that they could tell this to the messengers, 

The Indians seemed much delighted at his courage, dancing on the 
beach to show their satisfaction Cartier, however, desired to impress them 
still further with the Frenchman's power, and had a dozen of his cannon 
loaded with bullets and fired into the woods As the Indians heard the 
thunder of the great guns reverberating for the first time from the hilla 
and rocks which were destined often to hear them again, and saw the 
destroying rain of bullets crashing through the trees, they were overpowered 
with amazement and terror, and fled howling and shrieking far into the 
forest. 

Cartier now laid up his two larger ships in the St. Charles, and in his 
smallest vessel, the " Hermerillon," set sail again on the noble river 



g BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

The September sunshine lay soft and golden on the yellowing forest, as the 
little bark floated slowly on between the high, wooded shores. Cartier 
marked all the features of the scenery with keen eye and eager observation ; 
the broad windings of the river, the strange luxuriant foliage and clinging 
grape-vines that stretched their clustered festoons from tree to tree, the 
immense flocks of water-fowl they startled as they passed, the bright plumage 
of the golden oriole, the scarlet soldier-bird and the woodpecker, and the novel 
notes of the blackbird, robin and whip-poor-will, in which last the imaginative 
Frenchmen tried to believe they heard the voice of the nightingale once more 

The galleon grounded in Lake St. Peter, and from thence the party 
proceeded in small boats, between lower and tamer banks, till, on the second 
of October they approached the beautiful forest-crowned slopes of the hill 
below which lay the renowned Hochelaga. As they drew near Indians 
thronged the shore, dancing, singing, and shouting their rude welcome, 
offering ready gifts of fish and maize, in return for which they joyfully 
received beads and knives. As the early autumn dusk drew on bonfires 
blazed up, and they could see the savages performing their wild dances in 
token of rejoicing. 

In the early dawn of the third of October Cartier landed with his men, 
including the French nobles who accompanied him, in all the splendor of 
full dress and martial accoutrements. The early morning air was sharp and 
clear, the ground crisp with hoar-frost, the leaves fast turning to crimson and 
gold, and the falling acorns were strewn along their forest path. 

They were met on the way by an Indian chief — " one of the principal 
lords of the said city," as the old story calls him — followed by a numerous 
train. They were received with the usual grave courtesy of the red man, 
and seated by a fire which had been kindled for their comfort. The chief 
made them a long address in his own language, and received, with much 
satisfaction, the gifts of hatchets, knives, and a crucifix which he was asked 
to kiss, in token of respect. Marching on a little further through the forest 
they came out on the cleared fields of yellow, rustling maize that encircled 
the Indian town, of which nothing could be seen, at first, but the 
protecting palisn les. These were three rows deep, after the fashion already 



JACQUES CARTIER. 11 

described, with rude defensive fortifications and ammunition of stones. They 
enclosed about fifty large oblong huts, made of sapling poles and roofed with 
bark, each containing several families and several fires — some of them being 
divided into several rooms surrounding the central one, which contained the 
social fire, each family having also its own fire. These fifty houses held 
about a thousand or fifteen hundred inhabitants, so that Hochelaga was at 
least a respectable village. 

In the middle of it was an open square, about a stone's throw in width, 
and here Cartier and his companions held a confei-ence with the inhabitants, 
who swarmed out of their huts — men, women and children — to survey and 
touch the mysterious strangers so unlike anything they had ever before seen 
or imagined. The women crowded about their visitors in admiration, even 
touching their beards and moustptches, and holding up their children thai 
they might be touched by these wonderful beings. The men, who wero 
smooth-faced themselves, thought the beards and moustaches very ugly, bu' 
they could not resist the impression made by their imposing air, manner 
and dress. 

But the " braves " called the village to order, sent the women and 
children indoors, and squatted round the French in rows, as if they were 
going to look at a play. Then the squaws brought mats of plaited rushes and 
laid them on the ground for the strangers, after which the ruling chief, a 
helpless paralyzed old man, was carried out on a deer-skin and laid down at 
Cartier's feet. A red fillet worked in porcupine quills was the only thing 
that relieved his generally squalid appearance, and betokened his chieftain- 
ship. He could not make a dignified oration, like Donnacona ; he could 
only point to his powerless and shrivelled limbs, silently imploring from the 
white strangers the touch in which Indian superstition supposed a mysterious 
healing power to lie. Cartier willingly fulfilled the request, though we are 
not told whether it did any good ; and the grateful old man gave him his 
red fillet in token of his thanks. A throng of sick, lame, infirm and blind 
people then crowded about the French captain to share the healing touch. 

Sorely puzzled what to do, Cartier had recourse to the sign of the Cross, 
pronouncing over his patients a portion of St. John's Gospel, with a prayer 



12 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

not only for the healing of their bodies but of their miserable souls as well. 
Then he read to them from his French Testament, which was probably 
interpreted to them, the story of the death of Christ, to which they listened 
with grave attention. After that came what they understood much better — 
the distribution of gifts ; knives and hatchets for the men, gay strings of 
beads for the women, and for the children little pewter figures for which they 
scrambled in glee. Then the trumpeters gave a blast from their trumpets 
that at once amazed and delighted their hosts, after which they bade' them a 
cordial farewell, filing out of the village gates through a crowd of hospitable 
squaws, who urgently pressed upon their departing visitors fish, beans, corn 
and other novel food, all of which their guests courteously declined. 

Before departing, however, Cartier and his friends ascended the beautiful 
hill above the village. Delighted with the magnificent view of broad 
river and boundless forest and distant cloudlike mountain, he called the hill 
Mont Royal — Montreal. This name it has preserved ever since and as this 
we know the great busy city that has arisen at its base. As Cartier gazed 
wistfully over the endless masses of autumn-dyed forests that stretched 
away unbroken to the Gulf of Mexico, the Indians who had guided him told 
him wonderful tales of the length and breadth of this great river of 
Hochelaga, of the vast inland seas that lay beyond it, and of another mighty 
river still farther south, that wound down through softer climes into the 
land of perpetual summer. About the gold and silver that he most desired 
to hear of, they could tell him only that copper was to be found up the river 
Saguenay below Quebec. 

Cartier would gladly have pressed on up the enticing river that lay before 
him, past the foaming rapids whose snowy crests he could see flashing to 
westward, but he had no means of doing so, and the season was growing late. 
So, turning his back on the " Royal Mountain " on which he had planted a 
cross in token of claiming possession for " His Most Christian Majesty," he 
and his compa^iions began to retrace their way to the ships and the men they 
had left on the St. Charles. On the way he found some Indians less friendly 
than those of Hochelaga. He and his party were surprised while 



JAU14U1!;S UAKTIER. 13 

bivouacTcing on the shore, and but for the intrepid conduct of his English 
boatswain, might all have been massacred. 

At Stadacona Car tier was again kindly received by Donnacona and the 
Indians,' who had now laid up a store of provisions for the long winter. His 
men had built a palisaded fort round their ships and after his recent 
experience, Cartier thought it well to be wary in dealing with the savages, 
whose friendliness might not last, and so strengthened the little fort with 
uome of the guns from his ships. , 

But now the face of the country was changed indeed. The winds 
howled through the leafless forest, great masses of ice began to drift down, 
the St. Lawrence, and soon a solid bridge of ice was formed across the mile 
wide strait. As the snows and keen frosts shut the Frenchmen up in their 
narrow quarters, all they had formerly known of winter was mild, compared 
with what they now experienced. Their ships, though not burned, like those 
of the ancient Greeks, were frozen in and kept them prisoners till spring. 
Heavy snow-storms blocked up the shore, and the river became a dead white 
expanse of firm, snow-sheeted ice. Their ships, as well as the forest pines, 
glittered in a panoply of dazzling snow and sparkling ice, the hulls deep 
buried in snow drifts, the masts, spars and cordage encased in glittering ice 
and gleaming with fringes of hanging icicles, while the bulwarks were 
crusted with four feet of icy mail. 

The shivering Frenchmen, accustomed to the sunny mildness of 
France, and unprovided with warm clothing, clung to the protection of their 
ships and tried to keep themselves warm beside their fires. The Indians 
occasionally visited them, coming as Cartier says in his journal, " like so 
many beasts, wading half-naked in the snow," showing powers of endurance 
which the " pale-faces " must have thought wonderful. The savages, on the 
whole, seem to have treated them kindly and shared with them their winter 
stores. 

But a worse foe than cold now attacked the unfortunate explorers. The 
terrible scurvy broke out among them, and spread until out of the whole 
band of one hundred and ten only three or four healthy men were left to 
wait on the sick. The poor pnfPerers lay in hopeless misery — no doubt 



14 BUILDERS OP CANADA. 

thinking sadly of fair France and the homes and friends they might never 
see again. Twenty-six died before April, and the survivors, too weak to 
break through the ice-bound soil, buried the dead in the snow-drifts till spring 
should return. Their case grew more and more hopeless. Still Cartier did 
not lose his faith in God, who, as he said, ** looked down in pity upon us 
and sent to us a knowledge of the means of cure," in an unexpected way. 

He had been so much afraid lest the Indians should take advantage of 
their weak state to attack them that he had ordered his men to make all the 
noise they could with sticks and stones, so that they might be supposed well 
and hard at work. But one of these poor savages was made the means of 
saving them. One of their young guides, called Doregaya, who had himself 
been suffering from scurvy and had recovered, told Cartier of the remedy 
which had cured him — a decoction from an evergreen called Ameda, supposed 
to have been the spruce fir. The sick men eagerly tried it, and drank it in 
such quantities, that in six days they had boiled down a tree as large as a 
French oak ; and very soon all the invalids were restored to health, courage 
and hope. ; 

But at last the great snow drifts melted away under the warm spring 
sunshine, the ice slowly broke up, and the blue water, sparkling in the 
sunshine, gladdened the eyes of the imprisoned French. Cartier and his 
men joyfully prepared for departure ; but in leaving the country he 
committed a base and ungrateful act of treachery. During the winter he had 
heard strange stories from the Indians, of a region where gold and rubies 
might be found, of a white race like his own, of another able to exist without 
food, and of still another created with but one leg. 

Cartier wanted to take home some trophies of his enterprise, and to have 
his strange stories confirmed. And as the chief, Donnacona, had traveled 
far and professed to have seen many wonders, Cartier conceived the wicked 
project of carrying off by force Donnacona and some of his braves. So, 
having decoyed them on board his ships he set sail with them, first attaching 
the French flag to a great cross which he had set up on the shore. This 
cruel and false act, done under the shadow of the sacred emblem, was a foul 



JACQUES CAETIEB. 15 

stain on the honor of the brave explorer, and, like most such actions, brought 
its just recompense in future disaster. 

It was five years before Cartier again saw the shores of the New World, 
France was distracted by wars abroad and religious persecutions at home, and 
the project of a third expedition met with little favor. The terrors of 
the severe winter, the death of so many of the exploring party, and the lack 
of success in finding gold and silver, caused much opposition to the 
expenditure of more money — and perhaps of life — in what seemed a fruitless 
undertaking. But there were some who saw the advantage of opening a 
large fur trade with the savages, and who urged that Sj^ain and Portugal 
should not be allowed to have all the spoils of the New World to themselves. 

At last a great French noble, the Sieur de Roberval, asked the king to 
make him governor of all the newly discovered countries, with the right of 
raising a band of volunteers to found a colony ; one of the objects of which 
was stated to be the conversion of the Indians, as " men without knowledge 
of G.od or use of reason." Yet Cartier, who was made commander of the 
expedition, was allowed to take many of his " colonists " out of the French 
prisons. As the same error was frequently repeated in the French attempts 
to colonize Canada, it is not surprising that the French trappers and 
half-breeds should often have been a wild and lawless race. 

The Spanish emperor, who claimed the entire country between the Gulf 
of Mexico and the North Pole, under the name of Florida, made all the 
opposition he could to the execution of this project. But at last the little 
squadron of five ships lay ready to start, under the old port of St. Malo, 
awaiting the arrival of some artillery from Roberval. Tired of his 
weary waiting, Cartier set sail, leaving Roberval to follow. Again the 
squadron was dispersed by storms, and again the ships were reunited at 
Newfoundland. As Roberval's vessels were not yet to be seen, Cartier once 
more entered the Gulf, passed the great, sombre, pine-clad hills, the dark 
gorge of the Saguenay, the snowy sheet of Montmorency, and the rich woods 
of the Island of Orleans, and again cast anchor under the grand rock of 
Quebec. The Stadacona Indians came out quickly in their canoes, anxious 
to see again the faces of their long-absent friends. Alas ! all had died in 



10 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

France — probably of homesickness. Cartier was afraid to tell the truth, so he 
said that Donnacona was dead, but that the others had married grand ladies 
in France, and lived there in state like great lords. The Indians said little, 
but they probably disbelieved the story, for they showed themselves averse to 
further intercourse with the French and to their settlement among them. 

Finding that this was the case at Stadacona, Cartier sailed some nine 
miles farther up the St. Lawrence to Cap Rouge, a reddish headland where 
the high bank of the river divides to let a little stream run out through a 
green, sheltered glade. Here the party landed, explored the wooded heights 
and the shady lea, picked up sparkling quartz crystals which they took for 
diamonds, found a slate quarry, some glittering yellow dust which to them 
was gold, but whch was probably sand rajxed with mica, and slender, shining 
scales of the mica alone. 

They rested from their toil in the August heat under the shade of the 
great forest trees and interlacing grape-vines, and decided to plant their 
colony on the heights of Cap Eouge. All were soon busily at work clearing 
the forest and sowing turnip seed, building forts and making roads ; while 
Cartier, leaving Vicomte de Beaupre in command, went on with two boats to 
explore the river above Hochelaga. But the bright, flashing rapids he had 
seen from Mont Royal proved an impassable barrier, so he returned to 
Charlesbourg Royal, as they had grandly named the settlement, to find that 
there was no news yet of Roberval, and that the Indians still kept aloof. 

Once deceived they would not trust the Frenchmen again. A cold, 
dreary winter followed, with justly estranged Indians around them, and 
bitter cold chilling their blood and depressing their spirits in this lonely and 
savage spot. And as soon as spring returned, the disheartened " colonists " 
hastened to set sail and return to France. 

On their way back they passed a fleet of fifteen fishing vessels lying at 
anchor in the harbor of St. John's, Newfoundland, among which Cartier 
suddenly descried the long-expected ships of Roberval. Unforeseen obstacles 
had delayed him, and as he had supposed that by this time the colony was 
fully established, his surprise and anger were great when he found it on its 
way homeward. He ordered Cartier to turn back. But Cartier seemed to 



JACQUES CARTIER. 17 

have had enough of the projected colony, and, under cover of the darkness, 
escaped with his vessels, leaving Roberval to pursue his way and found his 
colon}' alone, 

Cartier had nothing this time to show, save his quartz diamonds, scales 
of mica and yellow dust. However, he received a patent of nobility for his 
discoveries, and seems to have settled down quietly in his little manor-house 
near St. Malo. Some say that he made a fourth voyage to Canada to bring 
back the luckless colonists of Roberval. He was, on the whole, a brave and 
gallant explorer, and his name must always be honored as the discoverer of 
Canada. Both name and fame would have been brighter but for the cruel 
act of treachery to his Indian friends, which so seriously interfered with the 
success of the attempted colony, and which was wiped out in after years only 
by some of the best blood of France. So true is it that 

*' The evil that men do lives after them." 

Cartier seems to have acquired sufficient wealth to retire from the sea. 
He took up his abode at the seigniorial domain of Lirooilou. In 1549 he 
was honored with the title of Sieur de Limoilou, and it is said that in the 
following year he was made a noble. In 1557 a plague visited the north of 
France and swept away many of the inhabitants, and amon^ those wno died 
was Jacques Cartier, the great discovfir^^r of Canada. 



CHAPTER IL 

SAMUEL DE CHAMPLAIN. 
By AGN^ Mauls Machar. 

Champlain a Favorite with the King — His Travels in the West Indies and Mexico — Chosen by 
De Chastes for an Expedition to Canada — Sails for the New World — Visits Quebec and 
Mont Royal — Learns of the Great Inland Seas — Returns to France — Sails for Acadia — 
Winters on the St. Croix — Sufferings «f the Colony — Settles at Port Royal (Annapolis) — 
The Romantic Life of the Colony — Port Royal Abandoned — Champlain at Quebec — Builds 
a Wooden Fortress — Champlain Assists Indian Allies Against the Iroquois — Visits Lake 
Champlain and Lake George — A Fight with the Indians — Champlain Sails for France — 
Back in Canada — Exploring the West — Wounded in Battle with the Iroquois — Descendo 
the Lachine Rapids — Goes to France in the Colony's Interests — In Canada Once More — A 
Wild Goose Chase up the Ottawa — Journeys Through the Country of the Hurons — Spends 
the Winter in the Wilderness Near Kingston — Puts Forth His Energy to Build up New 
France — Brings His Wife to Canada — The Jesuit Fathers Reach Quebec — The Company of 
the " Hundred Associates " Formed — David Kirke Attacks the Colony — The English Flag 
Float.^ over Champlain's Fortress — Champlain Taken to Loudon— Quebec Restored to the 
B'rench — Champlain Dies on Christmas Day, 1635. 

AMUEL DE CHAMPLAIN, the most picturesque of the early makers of 
Canada, was born at the sea-port town of Brouage on the Bay of 
Biscay in 1567. 

By profession he was a naval officer, but had seen much service on land, 
and had fought with distinction for his king in Brittany. 

When De Chastes, the good old Governor of Dieppe, went to court to beg 
from King Henry his patent of authority in Canada, he found there young 
Samuel de Champlain, a great favorite with the king on account of his brave 
deeds in Brittany. His adventurous spirit had already led him to make a 
hazardous voyage of discovery to the West Indies ; and notwithstanding the 
determination of the jealous Spaniards to keep out foreigners on pain of 
daath, he managed to visit Panama and the principal islands, and to 
penetrate as far as the city of Mexico, He brought back with him a j'ournal 
of his travels, illustrated with colored sketches of his own, and this, with his 
18 



SAMUBL DE CHAMPLAIN. 21 

lively narrative of the things he had seen, excited great interest at court. 
De Chastes was delighted with the young captain, whom he felt to be the 
very man he needed to help him in his enterprise, and begged him to accept 
a post in his new company. This the eager explorer, securing the king's 
consent, was delighted to do. Champlain was soon ready to start with 
Pontg3'ave on a preliminary exploring tour in two small vessels which — 
small as they seemed — carried in them the hope of the New France, soon to 
arise in the wilderness. 

As they passed through the Straits of Belle Isle and sailed up the Gulf, 
Charapl'ain's quick, observant eye noted all he saw, with an attention that 
stood him in good stead in after years. The great shaggy hills, wooded from 
base to summit, unfolded themselves in a long succession of grand curves, 
as the Gulf narrowed into the river — filling him with admiration and a 
desire to go up and possess this goodly land. He noted the lonely little niche 
among the rugged, fir-tufted rocks that guard the mouth of the sombre 
Saguenay — the site of the abandoned settlement of Tadousac. Passing by 
tlie Isle aux Coudres, and the Island of Orleans, Champlain's eye marked 
with keen interest the commanding rock of Quebec, his future fortress, and 
the Gibraltar of Canada. 

Sailing onward still between more gently sloping shores and leaving 
behind them the grand vista of mountain summits that encompass Quebec, 
they followed the winding river till they reached the spot where, sixty-eight 
years before, Cartier had found the Indian town of Hochelaga, lying at the 
foot of Mount Royal. The beautiful hill and its glorious view of forest, river 
and mountain were unaltered ; but the Indian village had disappeared. By 
ravages of war or pestilence, the earlier Mohawk population had been swept 
away, and only a few wandering Algonquins, of different race and lineage, 
were now to be seen. Like Cartier, Champlain tried to force his way up the 
white flashing rapids of Lachins; but their resistless sweep was too much 
for paddle and pole and even for Champlain's determination ; and the 
attempt had to be given up. His Indian assistants to console him, drew on 
the deck of his ship a rude map of the upper portion of the great river, with 
^ rapids and islands, and the chain of soa-lrke lakes fit its eaeidm 



^ BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

extremity. They gave him, too, some confused description of the grand 
cataract of Niagara, mentioned for the first time in his great map as a 
"very high rapid, in descending which many kinds of fish are stunned." 

Champlain, unsatisfied, was obliged to return to France, preparing on 
his way a chart and narrative of his voyage and observations for the benefit 
of the king and De Chastes, the patron of the enterprise. But the good old 
governor, who desired to devote his last days to the conversion of the Indians, 
had died during his absence King Henry, however, was much interested in 
the story, and ere long a new aspirant appeared for the honor of founding the 
colony. This was the Sieur de Monts, a Huguenot gentleman holding a high 
position at Court. He received the title of Lieutenant-General in Acadie, 
with vice-regal powers and a monopoly of the fur-traffic in the large region 
then first called by that name, including a large part of Canada and the 
Northern United States. 

The fur-traders of Normandy were naturally discontented at losing the 
privileges which they had previously enjoyed ; but De Monts wisely removed 
their jealousy by making them his partners in the enterprise. And so, in 
spite of the opposition of the king's minister, Sully, who had little faith in 
the settlement of such a savage wilderness, the expedition was organized, 
including some of the chief merchants of St. Malo, Rouen, Dieppe and 
Rochelle. Four large ships were fitted out, two of them as a coast-guard, to 
seize all other trading vessels, while the other two were to carry the colonists 
to their new home. 

Unhappily M. de Monts — able, experienced and patriotic as he was — 
continued to act on the mistaken plan of taking emigrants by force from llie 
vagabonds and criminals of the community. But he had also eager and 
chivalrous volunteers of the noble blood of France, impelled either by love of 
adventure or the desire to restore fortunes ruined by the civil wars. Some, 
too, were glad of the chance of escaping from the increasing pressure of royal 
power, so intolerable to the proud and haughty barons of that age. 

One of these, the Baron de Poutrincourt, was a leading spirit in the 
expedition, inspired by Champlain's glowing descriptions, and anxious to 
settle with his family in a country where royal prerogative seemed as yet 



SAMUEL DE CHAMPLAIN. 23 

unknown. There were also, among the emigrants, skilled artisans, and 
Huguenot ministers, as well as Roman Catholic priests. The former were 
not to be allowed to act as missionaries to the Indians, for though De Moiils 
was himself a Protestant, he could not procure for his fellow ProtestanU 
toleration in America any more than in France, except on the condition that 
they should not try to make converts. Notwithstanding this, however, the 
priests and ministers had many keen discussions during the voyage, in which 
all occasionally lost their temper. 

M. de Monts, dreading the severe winters of which he had heard so 
much, steered his ships farther south along the shore of Acadia, where it is 
now called Nova Scotia, a land rich in minerals and fur-bearing animals. 
In a bay near Cape La H^ve, De Monts found and confiscated a French 
trader, pursuing the fur-traffic, probably in ignorance of the proclamation 
which made it illegal. The name of its captain, Rossignol, was given to the 
bay, now Liverpool Harbor. Another bay took the name of Port Mouton, 
from a poor sheep that leaped overboard there while they were waiting for 
Pontgrav^'s store-ship. It appeared at last, laden with the spoils of four 
more fur-traders, and supplying the other ships, passed up to Tadousac to 
procure more furs from the Indians. 

As the expedition rounded Cape Sable and entered a bay, afterwards 
called St. Mary's Bay, a part}'- landed to explore the neighborhood. One of 
the party was a priest called Nicholas Aubry, who strolled a little way off by 
himself through the primeval forest where everything was so new and 
interesting. It was a warm day in June, and the priest who was tired and 
thirsty after his long ramble, stopped to drink from a clear stream, flowing 
invitingly through the tangled woods. When he overtook his companions 
he found he had forgotten to pick up the sword which he carried and had 
laid down on the grass. Going back to look for it, he lost his way in the 
confusing and trackless wood. In vain he tried to find his way out, and in 
vain his alarmed comrades sought and called him. The woods rang with 
his name, trumpets were blown and cannon fired from the ship ; but all in 
vain. As often befalls wanderers in the woods, the lost man wandered 
farther away in the wrong direction. His comrades gave up the search ard 



24 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

departed, even suspecting foul play on the part of a Huguenot fellow- 
[)assenger, whose vehement denials could not remove this horrible suspicion. 

The ships sailed away at last to explore the great Bay of Fundy, while 
the poor priest was left an unwilling hermit — to wander disconsolate through 
I he forest mazes, living on such wild fruits as he could find, " his drink the 
crystal rill," and his bed — not a bad one in June — a couch of soft moss 
under some overshadowing oak or hemlock. 

His comrades almost forgot him in the interest of coasting along the 
shores of the yellow Bay of Fundy, called by M. de jMonts La Bale Franyaise. 
Entering a small inlet, they suddenly found themselves in a beautiful and 
spacious harbor, lined with green, forest-clad slopes and watered by winding 
rivers that broke out into snowy waterfalls as they found their way into the 
sea. The Baron de Poutrincourt was charmed with the sylvan beauty of the 
scene, and at once obtained from De Monts a grant of the place, which he 
called Port Royal, intending it to be his future home. 

It seems strange that De Monts did not at once fix on this inviting site 
for his colony. But, like many another adventurer, he went farther and 
fared worse. Not wishing to risk wintering without defense among unknown 
Indians, they sailed along the shores of New Brunswick, discovered and 
named the river St. John, and ended their cruise amid the numberless 
islands of Passamaquoddy Bay. In the centre of its curve a broad river 
flowed quietly out among rocks and shoals from low, wooded banks. 
Champlain gave the name of St. Croix to it and to an islet within its mouth. 
On this they determined to plant their colony, close to what is now the 
boundary between Canada and the United States. It was a long, narrow 
island, some ten acres in extent — its grassy covering springing from a barren 
and sandy soil, with a fringe of straggling bushes and stunted cedars. This 
bleak and uninviting site was too hastily chosen ; simply because it 
commanded the river and could be easily fortified. 

All hands were soon at work, except a small party who went back to 
St. Mary's Bay, in search of gold and silver. As they neared the ^hore they 
noticed a small black object set up on a pole. It turned out to be the hat of 



SAMUEL DE CHAMPLAIN. 25 

the lost priest, whom they soon discovered, starved and emaciated, after 
sixteen days of solitude and involuntary fast. 

The exploring party, having found their lost comrade, instead of 
precious metal, returned with him to the busy settlers at St. Croix. There, 
nobles, artisans and sailors were busy making the most of the late summer 
and autumn days. Before winter set in their buildings and defenses were 
completed. A fort, crowning a knoll at one end, and a battery set on a rock 
at the other, provided against dangers that never arose in the short history 
of St. Croix. 

Around the fort clustered the dwellings, storehouses, chapel, barracks 
and magazine, forming a square shaded by a solitary tree. The spacious 
mansion of De Monts was surmounted by an enormous roof, and behind it 
was a long gallery for use in bad weather. Champlain built his house 
himself, as did D'Orville, with the help of his servants. A great baking oven 
of burnt brick completed the establishment, which, of course, was surrounded 
by palisades. Near the church was a cemetery, only too much needed 
during the dismal winter. This "Abitation de St. Croix" may still be seen 
in Champlain's drawings, though every trace of building, except the old 
moss-grown foundations, have long since vanished. 

The work of building finished, the Baron de Poutrincourt sailed for 
France, to m.ake preparations for settling in his new domain of Port Royal. 
After his departure, the population of St. Croix numbered seventy-nine men, 
including a number of cavaliers with the viceroy at their head, priests and 
Huguenot ministers, servants, laborers, artisans and soldiers. 

It was a busy little community — the only European settlement in all the 
vast and savage continent north of the Spanish settlements. As the late and 
shortening sunshine of October faded away, and the gloomy November days 
darkened over the sombre mountains, the shivering Frenchmen began to feel 
the full force of the dreary and rigorous winter that had proved so fatal to 
every previous attempt to found a Canadian colony. If the cold was not quite 
so severe as on the St. Lawrence, the season was not less dismal. The rapid 
river became clogged with cakes of ice, shutting them out from all their 
supplies of wood and water derived from the mainland. The leafless forests 



26 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

and the pine-clad mountains — wrapped in a dreary mantle of snow — looked 
bleak and desolate, when the bitter north winds swept down upon the islands, 
driving the whirling snow-drifts before them. The belt of cedars had been 
spared for the slight shelter it afforded, but still the keen, penetrating winds 
found easy entrance through the rudely-built dwellings, not half-warmed by 
scanty fires. Even cider and wine were served out frozen, and measured by 
the pound. 

The long-continued suffering from cold had its natural effect, not only 
on the spirits, but on the constitutions of the settlers. The inevitable scourge 
of scurvy broke out and carried off nearly half the colonists. The tree of 
healing, of which they had heard from the narrative of Jacques Cartier, was 
not to be found near St. Croix ; at least they sought it in vain. Most of 
the survivors were reduced to the last stage of exhaustion ; and despair 
and despondency reigned supreme in the hearts of the settlers, save only in 
the dauntless breast of Champlain, while a camp of Indians on their island, 
as to whose friendliness they were uncertain, kept them in constant anxiety. 
But with the lengthening days and cheering sights and sounds of 
returning spring, the diminished and forlorn band began to feel hope and 
courage revive. When the snow had disappeared, and the cry of the wild 
fowl, the balmy breezes and budding vegetation began to herald the 
approaching summer to the eyes of the waiting company, they, weary of their 
long, lonely exile, anxiously scanned the horizon in search of the returning 
sails of Poutrincourt, bringing reinforcements and succor. But the baron 
was meeting with unexpected difficulties at home, and it was the ship of , 
Pontgrave, coming from Tadousac, that at last, on the 16th of June, 
gladdened their eyes, and cast anchor in the harbor with a reinforcement of 
forty men. 

Privation and suffering had, by this time, made the viceroy weary of 
St. Croix, and he lost no time in setting out with Champlain on a voyage of 
discovery, anxious to find a more attractive and favorable site for the capital 
of his colony. The exploring party included, besides De Monts and 
Champlain, several gentlemen, twenty sailors, and an Indian with his squaw. 
The expedition coasted along the rofk-bound and indented shores of Maine, 



SAMUEL DE CHAMPLAIN. 27 

where, fifteen yea.rs later, the " Men of the Mayflower " were to found New 
England. 

They penetrated into the deep bays and among the picturesque 
headlands and islands, landing daily, exchanging presents with the Indians, 
and examining the natural products of the country ; while Champlain 
observed, sketched, made charts and took notes, describing with the closest 
accuracy all that he saw, from the round, mat-covered wigwams of the 
Indians to the appearance and habits of the horse-shoe crab. 

The Indians seem to have been much more numerous than when the 
Puritans, a few years later, landed at Plymouth, and they cultivated the art 
of agriculture to a considerable extent, for around their wigwams were 
patches of corn, beans, squashes, esculent roots and tobacco. 

Champlain had been over part of the ground before, in the previous 
September, when he had visited and named Mount Desert, and entered the 
river Penobscot, then bearing the name of Norembega, in common with the 
whole surrounding region. 

Passing southward along a coast, now thickly dotted with favorite and 
fashionable watering places, the explorers extended their cruise beyond Cape 
Cod, into an inlet full of sand-bars, which they called Cape Malabar. 
And here occurred the first collision of the white man with the Indians, 
with whom all their intercourse had previously been most peaceable. It 
arose out of a squabble in which the Indians were the aggressors. One of 
them snatched a kettle from a sailor, going to bring water from a spring, 
and, as he pursued the thief, he fell, pierced with arrows. The French at 
once fired from their vessel, and Champlain was nearly killed by the 
bursting of his own arquebuse, while the savages swiftly fled to the woods. 

Thus the first blood was drawn, and the first shots fired of the long and 
bitter conflict between the red man and the white ; while the incident 
showed the uncertain hold of peace and friendship with these wild and 
undisciplined tribes. 

As August approached, the voyagers found their provisions failing and 
returned to St. Croix, having discovered no site that altogether pleased the 
leader But another winter at St. Croix was not to be thought of, and 



28 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

De Monts remembered the tranquil beauty of Port Royal, as Poutrincouri 
had called tlie domain granted to him, and now known as Annapolis Basin. 
Thither, accordingly, across the Bay of Fundy, was transported everything 
they could carry, including stores, utensils, and even portions of the 
buildings which had composed the ^'Abitation de St. Croix.'' 

The work of " clearing " the new site went vigorously on, and soon a 
new settlement arose in the forest encircling the beautiful harbor. But still 
there was no sign of Poutrincourt's return, and ere long the viceroy heard 
bad news from France of obstacles thrown in the way of his enterprise by 
those who were aggrieved by the monopoly. In order to help Poutrincourt 
to overcome these difficulties, M. de Monts sailed for France, leaving 
Pontgrave to command at Port Royal, where Champlain and other 
undaunted spirits were resolved to dare another vvinter of peril and privation. 

In the fair and sheltered haven of Port Royal it did not take the 
colonists long to create a new home, partly built of the dismantled buildings 
of St. Croix, and somewhat on the same plan. The winter was milder here, 
but it did not pass without suffering, though less from cold than from lack of 
food. The settlers had only a hand-mill for grinding their corn, and bread 
was, consequently, scarce. De Monts was away in France, fighting for the 
colony against the indifference and prejudices of even its friends, and the 
active hostility of its enemies. Poutrincourt, despite urgent business in 
France, speedily returned to Canada, bringing with him his enthusiastic and 
poetic friend Marc Lescarbot, who was said to be as well able to build up a 
colony as to write its history. He explained the impulse that led him to the 
New World in the true and noble words : " God awaketh us sometimes to 
stir up the generous actions such as be these voyages." His active and 
vigorous mind and quick observations proved of great service in promoting 
the interests of the colony, as well as in writing an interesting and poetical 
history of its career. 

It was only, however, after many obstacles had been surmounted, that 
Poutrincourt and Lescarbot, a poet and dreamer, with their band of laborers 
and mechanics, were able to sail from Rochelle, in a ship bearing the rather 
curioup name of ".Tonas." T>9 Monts remained in France for a time to do 



SAMUEL DE CHAMPLAIN. 31 

what he could there for the interests of the colony, as one of the complaints 
of its enemies was that nothing had yet been done for the conversion of the 
Indians. But the zeal for the Mission in New France had yet to be awakened. 

The voyage was long and tedious ; it extended to two months by reason 
of the dense fogs that descended upon them as they neared land. Suddenly, 
however, the sun broke through the veil of mist, revealing to the delighted 
Lescarbot the fair face of the New World, bright in the July sunshine. He 
poetically described their first experiences, while a line of white breakers still 
lay between them and the shore : " While we followed on our course, there 
came from the land odors incomparable for sweetness, brought with a warm 
wind so abundantly that all the Orient parts could not produce greater 
abundance. Wa did stretch out our hands, as it were, to take them, so 
.palpable were they, which I have admired a thousand times since." 

Sailing into the calm harbor of Port Royal, the " Jonas " soon reached 
the spot where, amid the deep green of the almost unbroken forest, 
were clustered the wooden buildings of the little colony. They saw no sign 
of human existence till an old Indian appeared cautiously paddling a birch 
canoe. Then a Frenchman, armed with his arquebuse, came down to the 
shore, and at the same moment a shot rang out from the little wooden fort. 
But the white flag at the mast reassured the two lonely Frenchmen who were 
left on guard in the absence of their comrades, gone to look for French 
fishing vessels and secure supplies. 

The long-imprisoned emigrants leaped on shore, eager to explore the new 
land, and the lately silent settlement soon rang with the merry voices and 
exuberant hilarity of the Frenchmen — rendered all the greater by a hogshead 
of wine which M. Poutrincourt opened in the courtyard. Meantime one of 
Poutrincourt's boats, exploring the coast, met Pontgrave and liis men, who 
returned at once to greet the newcomers. 

Soon, however, the party again divided. Pontgrave sailed back to 
France in the ship "Jonas," looking out for contraband fur-traders on the 
way. Poutrincourt started with Champlain on another voyage of discovery, 
which occupied two months. It proved very fruitless, and was at last cut 
sliort by the autumn gales. Unhappily, its chief incident was a collision 



32 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

with the Indians, who surprised the party by night and killed two out of 
five who were camped on the shore. The others fled to their tents under a 
shower of arrows from four hundred Indians, " bristling like porcupines," as 
Champlain's quaint pencil had sketched them. He and the other men, 
awaked by their cries, rushed to the rescue, charging and dispersing the 
yelling assailants. " So," as Lescarbot put it, " did thirty-five thousand 
Midianites fly before Gideon and his three hundred." 

The winter that followed was a cheery one, with a very different record 
from that of the miserable winters previously spent by Frenchmen in Canada. 
The cavaliers shot game in abundance, so that the settlers had bounteous 
stores of provisions and a generous supply of wine. Their quarters were 
tolerably comfortable — a quadrangle of wooden buildings inclosing a wide 
court, flanked by armed bastions made of palisades, and containing their 
large dining hall and lodgings, kitchen forge and baking oven, magazines 
and storehouses. From an arched gateway at one corner a short path led to 
to the water. 

In order to produce a little variety in their solitary and monotonous life, 
as well as to secure a regular provision for their table, Champlain organized 
the famous Order of a Good Time (L'Ordre de Bon-Temps). The Knights 
were fifteen in number, and a Grand Master or Steward was appointed for each 
day, whose duty it was to provide for the table of the company. In order to 
do this creditably, and add a new dish daily, the knights, in turn, worked 
energetically, supplying the board partly by their own exertions in hunting 
and fishing, partly by barter with the Indians. By this means the company 
fared sumptuously every day. 

With good food and good spirits to keep them well, the scurvy touched 
the colony very lightly ; four men, however, sunk under the influence of the 
winter's cold. But with returning spring all was activity once more. Even 
before the winter was over, the knights took a six-mile tramp, to see if their 
autumn-sown corn were sprouting under the snow, and there, on a bright, 
balmy winter day, they picnicked gaily in January. But now flelds and 
gardens were enclosed, and soon building and carpentering went on with 
energy, and the nets of the Ushers gathered in an abundance of herring and 



SAMUEL DB CHAMPLAIN. 33 

Other fish. Lescarbot gardened indefatigably, writing his history in the 
intervals of toil, and even Poutrincourt went to the woods to collect 
turpentine and manufacture it into tar by a process of his own invention. 

The colonists were much assisted by an old chief called Membertou, who 
became their staunch friend and ally. He was, unlike the Indians generally, 
bearded like a Frenchman, and was said to have been a cruel and treacherous 
warrior, notwithstanding his kindness to the French. But the busy life of 
the colony suddenly came to an unexpected close. 

One fine spring morning, Membertou's keen eyes discovered a distant 
sail. The colonists hailed the sight gladly, supposing it to be the long 
expected vessel of De Monts. But it was a bearer of bad news. The 
discontented fur-traders who had been shut out of the fur trade, had 
combined, by money and influence to secure the withdrawal of De Monts' 
patent of monopoly. This was a death blow to the colony, as the projects of 
the company would no longer bear the expense of it ; and Port Royal must 
be abandoned. 

Lescarbot, before leaving, celebrated in verse a warlike expedition of 
Membertou and his Indians. He went first, leaving with a heavy heart the 
corn-fields and gardens he had redeemed from the wilderness. Poutrincourt 
remained to the last with Cham plain, to see how the crops would turn out, 
following the rest of the expedition in an open boat to the rendezvous in the 
harbor of Canseau. 

In October the whole of the little colony was on its way to France, 
Poutrincourt alone cherishing the determination to return to the place which 
he claimed as his own. Though coming to an untimely end, this colony had 
at least left memories of kindness and good-will with the Indians, who 
bitterly lamented the departure of their friends, and entreated them to hasten 
their expected return. 

It might seem strange that during all the future eventful and tragic 
career of Port Royal, the gallant Champlain had no further part or lot in its 
fortunes. But he had by no means given up the project that was so near 
his heart. Champlain was specially fitted by nature to be the leader of a 
colony in a new country. He was a born explorer and knight-errant; 



36 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

the settlement into their hands and murder the brave leader. But one of the 
men who was to assist Duval in the plot, becoming conscience-stricken, 
confessed the whole to Champlain, who with great readiness and presence of 
mind succeeded in arresting the -four ringleaders. The greater number of 
the men had been frightened into joining in the conspiracy and were relieved 
at the discovery. Champlain generously pardoned them, but Duval was 
executed and the other ringleaders were sent to the French galleys. 

In September Pontgrav6 went to France with his load of furs, leaving 
Champlain with twenty-eight men to brave the terrors of the winter, so fatal 
to the parties of Cartier and Roberval. The cold did not seem quite so 
severe, possibly because Champlain and his men were better housed and fed. 
Yet, nevertheless, out of the twenty-eight eight only survived till spring, the 
rest having fallen victims to the inevitable scurvy which had broken out 
toward the close of the winter. And of these eight four were still suffering 
from this horrible malady. 

There was little to break the monotony of the short winter days and 
long nights. Champlain sometimes amused himself by trapping foxes, and 
watching the hungry martens as they sought for fragments in the vicinity 
of the settlement. 

Once a little excitement was caused by the appearance of a band of 
famished Algonquins who were collected on the opposite side of the river 
which was choked up with cakes of drifted ice. It seemed a desperate 
venture to cross in such circumstances, but the poor creatures were starving 
and hoped to get food from the French strangers. Champlain with anxious 
eyes watched them launch their frail canoes, one after another, only to be 
crushed between the grinding masses of ice. However, even then their 
agility saved them. They all leaped upon a moving sheet of ice, the squaws 
— weak and emaciated as they were — carrying their children on their 
shoulders, a feat that excited Champlain's astonishment. Standing on this 
frail support they began to utter wails of despair, expecting inevitable 
destruction. But their strange raft was unexpectedly driven upon the shore, 
where, worn almost to skeletons, they came up to the fort to beg for food. 
(Jhamplain willingly gave them all he could spare but it was not easy to 



bjlmubl db champlain. 37 

satisfy the poor creatures who were so famished that they seized and ate even 
the frozen carcass of a dog that had been lying for months on the snow. 

Before the winter was over Champlain had another visit from . Indians ; 
this time a band of Montagnais who were living in huts near Quebec. The 
Indians were always much disturbed by dreams, and these had been excited 
and terrified by nightmare visions of fearful encounters with their enemies, 
the Iroquois. Their superstitious dread drove them to come to the fort to 
beg shelter for the night. Champlain pitied their terror, but thought it 
more prudent to take only the women and children into the fort, while the 
men remained watching and shivering without. 

At last, however, the dreary winter was over and gone ; the snow 
gradually disappeared, and the soft breezes, the swelling buds and opening 
flowers cheered the drooping spirits of the eight survivors. Champlain's iron 
constitution alone had been proof against the frightful scurvy. With a band 
so enfeebled there was nothing to be done but to wait for Pontgrave's return. 
It was a welcome sight when, at last, a sail rounded the Island of 
Orleans, bringing Pontgrave's son-in-law with the news that he himself was 
at Tadousac. Thither Champlain hastened to meet him and discuss his 
intended voyage of discovery. It was his cherished hope to realize the dream 
of a short passage to India and China, and he desired as ardently to gain 
influence over the Indians and convert them to the true faith, which, he sriJ, 
would be a nobler achievement than taking a continent. To these aims his 
life was devoted. 

But to his exploring zeal there was a formidable barrier. These vast 
forests were infested by a ferocious Indian tribe called the Five Nations or 
Iroquois, warlike and powerful, whose tomahawks were ever ready for action, 
and to whom an explorer must almost certainly fall a victim, sooner or later. 
The other tribes lived in constant terror of these fierce savages who knew 
neither fear nor pity. It seems, at first sight, strange that Champlain, so 
desirous of carrying the gospel of love to the Indian tribes, should himself 
have taken the first step toward beginning a deadly warfare. But he was a 
soldier to the core as well as a born explorer, and the path of discovery 
seemed to him a war-path as well. 



S8 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

The Huron and Algonquin tribes, with which he had been on such 
friendly terms, pleaded with him, not in vain, to help them to overcome the 
strong foes they so much feared. And he naturally believed that if he could 
do them this service he would gain over them great influence which he could 
use to promote both his cherished projects. He had little idea, however, o^ 
the power and numbers of the savages whose enmity he so rashly provoked. 

It was in the middle of May, 1609, that Champlain set out with a war 
party of j\Iontagnais, bent on ascending, under their guidance the Rivilre des 
Ir iqiLois as the River Richelieu was then called. Before starting, the Indians 
held their war-dance, with which they began all such expeditions. They 
lighted a huge camp fire, decked themselves in paint and feathers, 
brandished their war-clubs, lances and stone hatchets, while their discordant 
yells blended with the hollow boom of their drums and woke the echoes from 
the frowning cliff above. 

The eager explorer soon found how little he could depend on the aid of 
his new allies. They encamped for two days on the way, and quarielled, the 
greater number going back in disgust to their homes. He found, too, that 
the ascent of the stream was barred by rocky ledges, over which the white, 
surging rapids dashed with furious force. He was obliged to send home his 
own boat and men, keeping only two Frenchmen with him, while the Indian 
warriors carried their canoes through the tangled forests to the smooth 
stream above. Then they re-embarked and paddled on their way, stopping 
at night to entrench themselves behind a barricade, when the chief would 
instruct his followers how to form their ranks in battle, by setting up an 
army of sticks called by their respective names, each in the position to be 
taken before the enemy. 

At last, however, Champlain had the satisfaction of entering the beautiful 
lake that still bears his name, and gazed with delight upon its bright 
expanse and its grand setting of mountain summits. Its shores were the 
hunting grounds of the fierce Iroquois, and the valley of New York state 
beyond it was dotted with the palisaded villages that formed their 
strongholds. To pass from Lake Champlain to Lake George and thence by 
portage to the Hudson, and attack the Mohawks in their home, was the plan 



SAMUEL DE CHAMPLAIK. 39 

of the Indian warriors, provided they did not meet tlie enemj'^ on the way. 

But at Crown Point, afterwards noted in the warfare of the white man, 
this expedition of red men discovered at night fall, through the dusk, a 
flotilla of the Iroquois canoes. Dark as it was the enemies recognized each 
other with savage war-cries. The Iroquois landed close by and labored all 
night, as Champlain could see, at the work of entrenching themselves behind 
a barricade, made of trees felled on the spot. Champlain's allies lashed their 
canoes together with poles and danced and shouted till morning broke. 

The three Frenchmen lay concealed, each in his canoe, till the critical 
moment approached. When the attacking canoes reached the shore and their 
owners landed, Champlain could see some two hundred tall, strong Indian 
warriors advancing from the forests to meet them, some of them wearing a 
primative kind of armor made of interwoven twigs, or shields of wood and 
hide, while the chiefs could be distinguished by the tall plumes on their 
heads. As they approached the attacking Indians called for their gallant 
defender, who came forward before the astonished Indians in the garb of a 
French soldier, and fired his arquebuse. As its report resounded two of the 
Iroquois warriors fell. The savages replied with a yell and showers of 
arrows, but shots in rapid succession soon broke their advance into a 
retreat, and they fled in terror and confusion. 

The victory was complete but the tortures inflicted on their prisoners by 
the Indians sickened the heart of Champlain, w^ho remonstrated indignantly, 
but in vain. Then, satisfied with this successful skirmish, and probably 
fearing speedy vengeance, ^he party turned their canoes toward home. At 
the mouth of the Richelieu the expedition broke up, the Hurons and 
Algonquins steering for the Ottawa, while Champlain accompanied the 
Montagnais to Tadousac, where the squaws danced in glee to celebrate 
their victory, and swam out to their canoes to receive the heads of their 
slain enemies. 

Champlain soon sailed for France with Pontgrave and carried to King 
Henry a belt embroidered in dyed porcupine quills, and two bright 
plumaged Canadian birds as trophies of his adventures, while he entertained 
him with his lively account of them. De Mont«? was trying to secure the 



40 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

renewal of his monopoly, but, failing in this, he pluckily determined to 
go on without it. 

Early in the following spring Champlain and Pontgrav6 sailed again 
for New France. As usual, they found greedy fur-traders busy at Tadousac 
and on the Saguenay, exhausting the supplies so much needed for the 
support of the colony. 

Champlain had various schemes for exploring expeditions ready to carry 
into action. One of these was to go with the Hurons to see the great lake? 
and near them the copper mines, which they had promised to show him. 
They met accordingly at a rendezvous on the Richelieu. But while they 
were preparing for a dance and a feast, a canoe came, swiftly paddled toward 
them, bearing the news that a battle was going on in the forest between 
Algonquins and Iroquois. Champlain's Montagnais friends rushed to their 
canoes, taking Champlain with them and on landing bounded off through 
the woods like hounds after their prey. Champlain and his friends pressed 
on through the forest jungle as best they might, stumbling over fallen trees 
and entangling vines, wading through swamps, persecuted by legions of 
mosquitoes, until at last they came within hail of their forgetful guides. 

Champlain was wounded in the battle that followed ; but he fought on 
undaunted, assisted by some young Frenchmen from a fur-trader's ship in 
the neighborhood, and again won the day for his Indian allies. Again the 
fiendish tortures began and all Champlain could do was to save one prisoner 
from the ferocity of the victors. 

The allies rejoiced that a heavy blow had been dealt to their enemies, 
and a great band of Hurons who arrived next day were terribly vexed that 
they had come too late for the fray. The tumultuous savages celebrated 
their success with songs and dances, and then set out for home in their 
canoes, decorated with ghastly scalps, without a thought of following up the 
blow they had struck. Neither did Champlain insist on their guiding him 
on to the great lakes he had set out to reach. For startling tidings from 
France seemed, for the time, to drive these projects from his mind. 

Henry the Fourth had fallen beneath the dagger of Ravaillac. This 
was sad news for the hopes of Quebec, sad news for those of Port Royal 



SAMUEL DB CHAMPLAIN. 41 

Champlain must hasten home to look after the interests of his colony. 
Regretfully he left once more his post at Quebec, with his fields and gardens 
and vineyards redeemed from the wilderness ; and exchanged his forays 
with the wild warriors of the forest for unsuccessful pleadings at court, which 
were much less to his taste. He could not protect the interests of the colony 
on which he had spent so much labor, from the descent of swarms of 
fur-traders who bought up the skins which were all they cared about, and so 
exhausted the colony's only means of existense. When he returned, in the 
following spring, thirteen of them followed in his wake, ready to reap the 
profit of his labors. 

Champlain, however, had learned that patience and perseverance can do 
much toward success, and, undiscouraged, he chose a site for a new trading 
post at the foot of the beautiful Mont Royal, where he thought he could 
establish a trade with the great tribes of the interior as they came down from 
the Ottawa. Not far from the place where had once stood the Indian town 
of Hochelaga, on a spot now covered by the massive stone warehouses of 
Montreal, he cleared a site for his trading-post, and built a wall of bricks of 
his own manufacture to preserve it from damage by the " ice shove " in the 
spring. He called it Place Royale. The hospital of the Grey Nuns occupies 
a part of the Place. 

At this appointed rendezvous a band of Hurons were the first to arrive, 
paddling their canoes down the dashing surges of the Lachine rapids, then 
called the rapids of St. Louis. They invited Champlain to visit their 
country, buy their beavers, build a fort, teach them the true faith — do 
anything he liked, only they begged him to keep the greedy fur-traders away. 
They disliked and distrusted them, thinking that they meant to plunder and 
to kill them. Champlain did all he could to reassure them, and went to visit 
them at their camp on Lake St. Louis, from whence they conveyed him down 
the rapids in their canoes ; the third white man to descend the Lachine 
Rapids. 

Once more visiting France to consult with M. de Monts, Champlain 
succeeded in finding a new and powerful patron for New France in Henry of 
Bourbon, who became its protector. Champlain, however, continued to be 



42 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

the moving spring of its life. In order to secure his two-fold aim of 
converting the Indians, and finding a short passage to China, he needed the 
profits of the fur-trade, but he did not wish to keep these entirely to himself 
He was willing to share them with the traders, and he now offered them a 
chance of joining the new company. The ofier was accepted by the 
merchants of St. Malo and Rouen, but refused by those of Rochelle, who 
preferred to take the chances of unlawful trading. 

Champlain remained in France until the spring of 1613, the year in 
which Port Royal was destroyed by Argall the Englisliman. Of this, of 
course, he knew nothing at the time, and fortunately for Quebec the 
destroyer seems not to have heard of the little settlement under this lonely 
rock of the St. Lawrence. 

While his friends in Acadia were meeting with such overwhelming 
misfortunes, Champlain was ascending the Ottawa on another exploring 
expedition, to which he was lured by the false report of a young Frenchman 
who had volunteered to winter with the Indians, This young man brought 
to France a wonderful story of having ascended a northern river from the 
interior, and having discovered the shore of the Eastern sea. Champlain 
believed him and hastened to Canada to follow up the welcome discovery. 
He, with four Frenchmen and two Indians, set out from Mont Royal, in two 
small canoes which they dragged with great labor up the foaming rapids 
near Carillon, and reached the calmer stream which sweeps on between high 
hills to the present capital of Canada. They lighted their camp-fires at night 
on the shore, passed the snowy cascade of the Rideau and drew up their 
canoes below the point where the great caldron of the Chaudiere sends up its 
clouds of boiling spray. Champlain's Indians did not fail to follow the 
usual Indian custom of throwing an offering of tobacco into the cataract to 
please its Manitou or guardian spirit. 

Paddling on over Lake Chaudiere — obliged to carry their canoes across 
a portage, where the silvery cascades of the Chats Rapids dashed down 
among wooded islets — then paddling ud Lake Coulonge, they reached at last 
the settlement of the Ottawa chief, Tessouat, with its maize fields and bark 



8AMUBL DE OHAMPLAIN. 43 

wigwams. Here the young Frenchman had spent the winter, and from this 
point had set out upon his supposed discovery. 

Tessouat hospitably made a feast for Champlain at which the viands 
were broiled fish and meat with a sort of brose made of maize and scraps of 
meat thrown in. 

After the feast, when the pipes were being smoked, Champlain made his 
request for canoes and guides to follow up the journey of his informant. 
But he found, to his great vexation, that the young Frenchman's story was a 
lie, and that he had never gone farther than the settlement of Tessouat. 
Disappointed and disheartened, Champlain returned to Montreal, attended 
by a flotilla of Huron canoes ; and, magnanimously leaving the deceiver 
unpunished, he sailed in a trading ship for France. 

It was two years before he returned to Canada, bringing with him four 
Recollet friars, who had answered his appeal for aid in the Mission to New 
France. They chose a site for their home near the Ih_Wation of Champlain, 
and said the first mass with the entire settlement kneeling around them, 
while a salute of cannon burst forth to honor the occasion. Two of the friars 
set out to join the Indians in their roving life, living in their filthy and 
smoky lodges, and sharing their privations in the hope of winning them to 
the true faith. One of them, Le Caron, persevered in braving all the 
hardships of a winter among them, with this great end in view. 

Meantime the Hurons and Algonquins were again begging Champlain 
for help against the Iroquois. This it seemed necessary to give them, in 
order to keep them united by a common fear, and under his own influence. 
They met at Montreal in a great council, and Champlain promised again to 
join them with his men, while they undertook to muster an army of 
twenty-five hundred men for the proposed raid on the Iroquois. But when 
he returned to join them, the whole body of Indians, impatient of delay, had 
departed to their homes. 

Disgusted with the childish caprice of his Indian allies, Champlain set 
out once more to explore the region of the Ottawa. He reached the limit 
of his former journey and pressed onward, avoiding rapids by portages, 
paddling on the stream or forcing his way through the wilderness, till he 



44 BUILDEES OF CANADA. 

reached the shores of Lake Nipissing, the country of which he had heard so 
much. His two Indians had soon devoured all their provisions, and they 
were obliged then to subsist mainly on blueberries and wild raspberries. But 
he still kept his steady way westward until, paddling down French River, 
they came out on the great expanse of Lake Huron. Exploring its shores for 
a hundred miles he left his canoes somewhere near Thunder Bay, and 
followed an Indian trail through the forest till he met the welcome sight of 
the broad fields of maize and pumpkins that surrounded the palisaded 
villages and long bark lodges of the great Huron nation. At one of the 
largest and most populous of these, surrounded by a triple palisade thirty-five 
feet high, he found the Recollet friar, Le Caron. The missionary had made a 
little chapel of the bark lodge built for him by the Indians and in this he 
taught all who would come to him, and on the arrival of Champlain and his 
men, he said mass in his bark chapel with much rejoicing. 

Champlain soon cr>ntinued his journey to the capital of the Hurons, 
Cahiague, near Lake Simcoe, and tlien followed the devious chain of lakes and 
rivers till he came out at last on the shore of Lake Ontario. Crossing it to 
what is now the American shore, Champlain with the Huron army which 
had followed him from Cahiague pursued their way into the country of 
the Iroquois. 

An attack on one of their towns, well planned by Champlain, failed 
through the uncontrollable rashness and stupidity of the undisciplined Indians. 
Champlain was wounded, and the crestfallen Indians would not renew the 
attack, but retreated in despondency. They refused to escort Champlain to 
Quebec and he found himself obliged to spend the winter with them in the 
country northeast of the present city of Kingston. He joined his hosts in 
their deer hunts and once lost himself in the forests, in which he wandered 
shelterless for days and nights. He shared their marches through mud and 
slush, or on snow-shoes through the snow-clad forests. Finally, he returned to 
Cahiague, where the friar, Le Caron, was still working away in his difficult 
and solitary mission. Taking him with him, Champlain began the long and 
circuitous journey homeward, settling a quarrel between the Indians before he 
left, and exhorting thorn to keep tlio peace among themselves, and the alliance 



SAMUKL DB CHAMPLAIN. 45 

with tlie French, and getting a promise from the Nipissings to guide him to 
that Northern Sea whicli he still hoped to reach. 

In July having been absent for a year, he returned to Quebec accom- 
panied by the chief Durantal, who had been his host. He had been reported 
dead, and was greeted by the little colony as one they had hardly 
expected to see again, and with a hospitality and warmth that made him 
almost forget his long wanderings in the wilderness, and all the toil and 
[>rivations he had undergone. 

This was the last of Champlain's long voyages of discovery. He had 
penetrated into the depths of the wilderness far beyond where any white 
man had gone before him, and yet in all his devious wanderings he had 
never come nearer finding that short passage to India, which had haunted 
his dreams. He seems to have begun to feel the futility of spending strength 
and energy on so fruitless a quest, and also the uselessness of wasting 
his time and risking his life in the skirmishing forays of the savage?, 
which led to no result. He was growing older, too, and perhaps the 
adventurous forest life that had so fascinated him had somewhat 
lost its charm. At all events he now applied his whole strength to 
fostering the struggling life of his little colony, whose growth was so weak and 
slow. There was, as yet, only the first small cluster of buildings at the fooi 
of the cliff, his own Habitation, the trader's warehouses and the rude 
dwelling and chapel of the Recollet friars. But now he built a small fort on 
the height, behind the present broad Terrace, and around it soon clustered a 
few buildings and gardens ; among these the house and garden of the thrifty 
colonist, Hubert. The Recollets, too, some years later built their permanent 
home of stone — JS'otre Dame des Anjcs on the winding St. Charles — a mile 
and a half distant from the fort. 

Could Champlain have seen, as in a vision, the stately city that now crowns 
the promontory, and fills up the intervening space he would have taken heart, 
indeed, and felt that his labor had not been in vain. But then the prospect 
was not hopeful. The population of the settlement numbered only fifty or 
sixty persons, and these were mainly fur-traders with a few thriftlo.a 
hangers-on. The traders were jealous of each other, and of Chamjibdn, 



46 BUILDERS OF C AX AD A. 

and religious dissensions increased the lack of harmony. Still Champlain 
labored for its advancement with undaunted devotion going every year to 
France to watch over its interests there. 

In 1620, he brought his young and beautiful wife to her Canadian home, 
which, with buildings already falling into ruin, must have seemed cheerless 
indeed to a young and gentle lady reared in all the luxury of France. She 
took a warm interest, however, in the Indians who were so impressed by her 
beauty and gentleness that they were ready to worship her as a divinity. 
She lived four years in Canada, finding her chief interest in teaching the 
squaws and their children, but she at length followed her own strong desire 
to return to France, and spend the rest of her life in an Ursuline convent. 

So things went on at Quebec amid troubles from the emigrants, from the 
traders and occasionally from the Indians. Even the Montagnais, forgetful 
of past kindnesses, attempted an attack on the colony, which was quickly 
frustrated ; the Iroquois with more excuse assembled in threatening numbers, 
and even went so far as to make an assault on the Recollet convent, which 
had happily been fortified. 

In 1625, three Jesuit Fathers arrived, the first of the noted order to reach 
Quebec, where it was long to play an important part. Champlain, three 
years later, began to rebuild the fort, having with difficulty procured from 
the traders the means of doing so. Besides Quebec, there were now four 
trading stations : Quebec, Trois Rivieres, Place Royal, and the first and most 
important of all, Tadousac, besides a pasture outpost at Cape Tourmente. In 
1627 the great Richelieu came to the aid of Champlain and New France, by 
forming th^ ** Company of the Hundred Associates," having sovereign power 
over the whole of North America, included under the name of New France, 
with a perpetual monopoly of the fur-trade. The Associates were bound by 
their contract to increase by emigration the population of New France to 
four thousand persons, and to provide for their maintenance, and give them 
cleared land on which to settle. They were also to maintain exclusively 
the Roman Catholic form of religion, and the Huguenots were to be 
absolutely expelled from the colony. Champlain was one of the Associates, 
and their capital amounted to three hundred thousand livres. 



SAMUEL DK CHAMPLAIN. 49 

No sooner had the company been founded, however, than a similar 
calamity to that which had destroyed Port Royal, descended upon Quebec. 
England was as much opposed as ever to sharing with France the North 
American continent, and just as the famished inhabitants of Quebec were 
anxiously looking out for a fleet of transports, which was to bring them 
much-needed supplies, a fleet of six vessels under David Kirke, a Dieppe 
Protestant in English employ, bore down toward Quebec. With dilapidated 
defences, and an almost empty magazine, resistance seemed hopeless. The 
French transports were taken by the English ships on their way, and the 
long-looked-for supplies were seized or sunk in the river. The 
conquering squadron then sailed home, leaving the colony to a winter of 
starvation. By spring they had exhausted everything left to them, and were 
forced to look for wild roots and acorns to satisfy their hunger. 

Champlain even thought of making a raid on the Iroquois to procure 
food. In July the English vessels returned, and a boat with a flag of truce 
was sent ofi* to demand capitulation. Anything else would have been useless. 
The English undertook to convey the French to their homes and very soon 
the red-cross flag had taken the place of the Fleur-de-lis on the scene of 
Champlain's long and persevering labors. The blow was a heavy one, but 
even yet he did not give up his enterprise. He sailed with Kirke's squadron 
for London where he represented the facts to the French ambassador, who 
secured from the English king the restoration of New France to its original 
possessor in fulfilment of a treaty made in the previous April. 

In 1632 the French Admiral Caen demanded the surrender of Quebec 
from Thomas Kirke and the French lily again floated from the heights in 
place of the English cross. In the following spring Champlain resumed 
command. Aided by the Jesuit Le Jeune, he maintained an earnest, 
religious ritual and a strict discipline, which made the colony resemble a 
vast convent. Faithful to his great aim of converting the Indians to 
Christianity, he sought to win their regard by every possible kindness. But 
his active life, so devoted t6 the interests of New France, was almost over 
now, and on Christmas Day, 1635, all Quebec mourned, with good cause, for 
the brave leader and true knight who had entered into his well-earned rest. 



CHAPTEK IIT. 

PERE BREBCEUF. 

Pkre Br^boeuf a Type of the Best Missionary Spirit in Early Canada — Champlain Brings a 
Number of Missionaries to Quebec— Jean de Br^boeuf of a ?Toble Family of Normandy — 
Anxious to Go to the Huron Mission — The Hurons Visit Quebec as Fur Traders — The 
Missionaries Anxious to Go West with Them — Forced to Spend the Winter in Quebec — 
Their Desires Gratified in the Following Year — The Arduous Journey to the Huron 
Country — Br^boeuf Welcomed by His Old Pupils— The Savages Build the "Black Robes " 
a Fitting Residence — The Hurons Amazed at the Striking Clock of the Jesuits — The 
Indian Sorcerers Stir Up Enmity Against the Missionaries — A Severe Drought Attributed 
to the Cross on the Mission-House — A Plague of Small-Pox Carries off Many of the 
Hurons— Brdbceuf's Noble Work in this Trying Time— The "Black Robes" Held 
Responsible for the Plague — Their Death Decreed — Br^boeuf's Courageous Conduct — His 
Effort to Found a Mission in the Neutral Nation — The Iroquois Invade the Country of the 
Hurons — The Destruction of the Hurons — The Martyrdom of BrebcEuf — The Influence of 
the Jesuits on the I^ife of the Colony of New France. 



IN a book dealing with the makers of Canada, it is necessary to consider 
the early missionaries, who labored to so much purpose among the 

Indians. That New France was able to maintain an existence during 
a great part of the seventeenth century was largely due to these noble and 
self-sacrificing men who did much to hold the Indians in check. But little 
is known of the early life of any of them. It is not necessary that anything 
should be known of their parentage ; friends, the world, life itself, they were 
ready to sacrifice for the propagation of Christianity. Several of these men 
would make worthy subjects for study, but Pere Brebceuf is chosen as typical 
of the best missionary spirit in early Canada. 

In the latter part of May, 1633, Champlain, after one of his many 
voyages across the stormy Atlantic, reached the rocky fortress of Quebec. 
This time he brought with him a number of missionaries, who were to carry 
the gospel to the benighted Indians. Among the missionaries was one figure 
more striking than the others, Jean de Breboeuf, a man of a noble family of 
50 



PEES BE.EBCEUF. DJ 

Normandy. He was a tall man, with broad athletic shoulders and sinewy- 
limbs. Even in his black robes one could not but feel that he was a born 
soldier. His face, too, wore the stern expression of a man accustomed to 
deeds of daring and commanding, rather than to the milder aspect of a 
preacher of the Gospel of Peace. He had been in Canada for several years 
before this time, and in his laDors had founa that the Hurons on the shores 
of Georgian Bay needed him njost, and that the difficulties of that mission 
were suited to his daring spirit. He now came to Canada, anxiously looking 
for an opportunity to return to his former field of labor, and to what was Lo 
prove the scene of his martyrdom. 

The Hurons came to Quebec in July on their annual visit, with theii 
canoes laden with furs. A feast was held in their honor, and at the feast 
Champlain introduced the three missionaries, Daniel, Davost and Brebceuf, 
to the red men. The Indians had ever found the " Black Robes " loving 
and helpful, and several of the chiefs welcomed them with stirring speeclies. 
Br^boeuf could speak their language and replied with fitting words. The 
Indians had heard of him, and his noble bearing, and able, diplomatic 
address filled all with unbounded admiration, and many vied for the honor 
of carrying him in their canoes. The feast broke up, and the fathers made 
preparations for a long and trying journey. 

However, they met with a disappointment. A difficulty arose between 
the French and the Indians, and the latter paddled to their country refusing 
to carry the missionaries with them. The fathers lost no time, however, for 
they earnestly went to work at the Huron language, and spent the long 
Canadian winter in obtaining a speaking knowledge of it. 

Next year when the Hurons came down they took back with them the 
missionaries, who, with glad hearts, faced the journey of nine hundred miles. 
The canoes left Quebec and paddled slowly but steadily up the St. Lawrence 
till the Ottawa was reached ; and then began the difficulties of the way. 
The rapids of this great northern river forced them to portage, again and 
again, and not infrequently they had to wade waist deep in the boiling flood, 
dragging their canoes with them. The fathers, unaccustomed to such work, 
felt it keenly, and even Br^boeuf, strong as a lion, was almost exhausted. 



52 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

But they bore up manfully and did their share of the work, helping to carry 
the canoes past the rapids, or bending under loads of baggage, as they 
struggled over rocks or through dense woods. Nor had they proper food for 
such exhausting work. A little corn crushed between two stones and mixed 
with water was almost the only nourishment they had in the dreary thirty days' 
journey from Three Rivers to the Georgian Bay. But the heroic missionaries 
did not heed the trials and dangers, they were only anxious to save souls, 
and at night, as they lay on the rocks or hard earth and read their breviaries 
by the camp fire or the light of the moon, they rejoiced that God had put it 
into their power to at last labor in their chosen field. 

The canoes bearing them became separated on the journey, and when 
Breboeuf reached his destination on the shores of Thunder Bay his comrades 
were nowhere near. The Indians had agreed to carry him to this spot, and 
without a word deserted him and went to their respective villages. But he 
was not one to be disheartened. He hid his baggage in the forest and went 
in search of his future flock. He had spent three years in Toanche, a town 
not far distant, but it had been destroyed by fire. He passed by the ruins of 
this place and soon saw before him the roofs of the village of Ihonatiria. 

The villagers had probably heard that their old teacher was near them 
once more, for when his tall athletic figure was seen emerging from the thick 
forest they rushed out to meet him with the wildest enthusiasm, crying out 
" Echom has come again 1 " " Echom has come again I " He was led in 
triumph to their village, and feasted and cared for, and here he rested and 
awaited the arrival of his companions who were many days longer on the 
journey. 

The Hurons were glad to have the " Black Robes " among them once 
more, and several of the villagers combined to build them a fitting residence. 
Before the autumn leaves had all fallen from the trees a house thirty-six feet 
long by twenty feet wide was erected, and finished in a manner that did 
credit to its savage builders. The Jesuits fitted it up as well as possible 
under the circumstances. Among the things they displayed in their abode 
were some that filled the Indians with awe. A magnifying glass and 
multiplying lens puzzled their untutored senses ; and a hand-mill made them 



pisBS br:^bcsuf. 58 

reverence the ingenuity and skill of the white man. But the most amazing 
of all was a clock that struck the hours. The Hurons christened it the 
** Captain," and were never tired of sitting waiting to hear it strike. They 
asked what it ate, and what it said when it struck. The fathers put this last 
question to good purpose and declared that when it struck twelve times it 
said " hang the kettle on," and when four, "get up and go home." The 
Indians acted on the answer, and ever after at four o'clock the missionaries 
were left alone to worship together, to pray for the success of their labors, to 
study the Huron language, and to plan their work. 

Their labor was far from being pleasant. They had many difficulties to 
contend with and much to discourage them. The Indian sorcerers did all in 
their power to stir up enmity against them ; the savages were so deep-rooted 
in wickedness that they seemed little higher than the brute, and those that 
did confess their sins and receive baptism, too often did it for some present 
they expected from the scant store that the devoted men had brought with 
them. But Breboeuf was not to be daunted, and he went steadily and 
cheerily on with his work, helping his weaker comrades to bear up against 
their trials. 

A difficulty arose during the first summer of their sojourn among the 
Hurons. A severe drought had been burning the fields and withering the 
crops, and their enemies declared that it was caused by the red cross on the 
mission-house, that scared away the bird of thunder. A council was held, 
and it was decreed that the cross should be cut down. To save the emblem 
of their faith the fathers offered to paint it white, and when it was done, and 
the drought did not cease, the Indians thought they must try some other 
means of bringing rain. The sorcerers exerted themselves to bring it about, 
but their efforts were fruitless. At length the missionaries formed religious 
processions and offered up earnest prayers that the dry time might end ; and 
as rain came shortly afterwards the Indians as a people put great reliance in 
the white " medicine men," but the sorcerers hated them with an intensei 
hatred than at first. 

Soon after this the small-pox broke out and swept with d^dly might 
through the whole Huron nation. The Jesuits worked nobly. Night and 



64 BUILDEES OF CANADA. 

day Br6boeuf s commanding form might have been seen, passing from hut to 
hut, caring for the sick, nursing them with his own hands, toiling for the 
life of their bodies, and earnestly seeking to save their souls. They 
besought him to tell them what they should do to be saved, and Brisboeuf 
answered, " Believe in God ; keep his commands ; give up all your 
superstitious feasts ; renounce your sins, and vow to build a chapel to 
offer God thanksgiving and praise." These were diflScult things for the 
Indians to do, but several whole communities promised, and for a time 
struggled against their savage natures. But an evil day was at hand for 
Breboeuf and his comrades. Their old enemies the sorcerers, came among 
their flock and drew its members away to the worship of the Indian gods 
and to the practice of savage, disgusting cures against the disease. 

It was soon rumored abroad that the Jesuits had cast a spell over the 
Indians to get them into their power. They were held responsible for the 
plague, and the objects that had formerly pleased the wondering savages 
were now looked upon as things to be dreaded. The clock had to be stopped ; 
the religious pictures in the mission-house were turned from with horror, and 
even a small streamer they had set up was dreaded as a source of the disease. 

Day by day the antipathy increased, till at last they were shunned, 
hooted, pelted with sticks and stones, and even their lives were threatened, 
but Br6bceuf bore an undaunted presence and met all their attacks with a 
calm courage that filled the red men with admiration even in their hate. At 
length, however, after several councils had met, their death was decreed, and 
it was only the superstitious dread that the red men h^d of the great " white 
sorcerers" that kept the blow from falling. Breboeuf and his companions 
felt that the end was nigh, and assembled their flock together to a great 
festin d/ adieu, a farewell feast of one expecting death. Their courage in 
meeting their fate with their eyes open turned the tide in their favor, and, 
although the sorcerers still kept a large party among the Indians stirred up 
against them, their lives were never after in danger. 

In 1640 Brebceuf struggled to found a mission in the Neutral nation, but 
after four months of effort he returned to the town of Sainte Marie in the 



rksX BK^BCEUF. 55 

Huron country, and among his chosen people he labored for eight years, till 
he met his death at the hands of the Iroquois. 

These savages hated the Hurons with a deadly hatred, and in 1648 
planned an attack on their towns. They waited for the Huron traders to 
make their annual descent to the French posts. A sharp fight ensued ; all 
the Hurons were slain or captured, and the victorious enemy rushed on the 
town of St. Joseph which was soon laid in ashes. Here was slain the noble 
Daniel, and his body burned in the ruins of his church. Otner towns were 
raided and destroyed, and the Iroquois with scalps dangling from every belt, 
hurried back to their palisaded homes. 

In the following March they were once more on the war-path and the 
populous town of St. Ignace was soon given to the flames. From St. Ignace 
they impetuously dashed on St. Louis where labored Breboeuf and Lalement 
In a short time the town was taken and given to the flames. Breboeuf and 
his comrade played heroic parts, and died as perhaps martyrs never died 
before. Breboeuf particularly excited the vengeful spirit of the Indians, who 
were unable to make him cry for mercy. Above their savage yells his voice 
rang out exhorting his flock to remain firm in their belief, and to die 
Christians. So greatly was his spirit admired that the Indians, to gain 
something of his courage and strength, with savage superstition drank his 
blood, and their most noted chief ate his heart. 

So ended the labors of these heroes; and that the Indians of Canada held 
to the French with such affection was due almost altogether to the struggles 
and earnestness of perhaps the most devoted and heroic missionaries that 
the world has ever j>yeii* 



CHAPTER IV. 

ADAM DAUTiAC. 

The Iroquois Threatening Montreal — Adam Daulac Plans to Save the Colony — Goes Forth 
with His Heroic Band to Meet the Savages — The Trip Up the Ottawa — Awaiting the 
Enemy at the Foot of the Long Saut — Joined by a Party of Hurons and Algonquins — 
Ambushing the Iroquois — A Siege Without a Parallel in Canadian History — The Sufferings 
of the Besieged — Efforts of the Iroquois to Storm Their Position — Deserted by Their 
Huron Allies — The Iroquois Send for Reinforcements — The Final Struggle — A Breach in 
the Wall — Daulac and His Comrades Slain — Mourning at Montreal on News of Their 
Death— The Colony Saved. 

TOO often valorous deeds are thought of by themselves ; their setting 
is forgotten and in this way much of their significance is lost. The 
action of one man may have more influence on the progress of a 
campaign or even the development of a country than a battle where large 
armies are engaged. The brave deed of the Canadian pioneer, Adam 
Daulac, which has come down to us, is related here not merely because it is 
a heroic incident in the making of Canada, but because it was of vital 
importance in the life of the young colony. At the time when it took place 
Canada was threatened with destruction ; a scourge similar to that which 
nearly a century later swept the frontiers of Pennsylvania, Maryland and 
Virginia was pressing hard on the frontiers of New France, and it looked 
as if the efforts of such men as Champlain and Maisonneuve were to be in 
vain. The scalping knife and the tomahawk of the Iroquois threatened to 
annihilate the settlements thinly scattered along the St. Lawrence. But the 
hordes of savages were to be turned back from their career of plunder and 
murder, not by the trained soldiers sent from old France to protect the 
colony, but by the gallant conduct of one young Frenchman and a handful 
of his comrades. The story of their exploit is well worthy of a place in a 
book dealing with the making of Canada. 

During the latter part of the winter of 1660, the little settlement of 
Montreal was kept in perpetual excitement by alarming rumors of the 
56 



ADAM DAULAa 59 

warlike designs of the Iroquois. Hunters, trappers and friendly Indians 
were all agreed as to the vast numbers of these irrepressible savages, who 
were wintering in Canada, far from their own villages to the south of Lake 
Ontario, in order to be ready for their murderous and plunderous descent just 
as soon as the French should begin to break up the soil and sow their spring 
Drops. 

These reports greatly disheartened even the most sanguine of the 
jolonists, and they feared lest the colony should be swept out of existence. 
While so many hearts were trembling with fear, there was one young man in 
Montreal whose breast burned with a warrior's delight at hearing these 
rumors, greatly exaggerated as they often were. This young man was Adam 
Daulac, Sieur des Ormeaux. Though but twenty-five years of age, he had 
already seen a good deal of service ; but while a soldier in old France, had 
in some way stained his character, and was longing to wipe out the stain by 
some heroic deed. 

He felt that now was the time for action. For years the French had 
suffered from the inroads of the Iroquois, but had never yet gone out to meet 
their savage foes, satisfying themselves with repulsing them from behind 
stone walls, or palisaded log-built forts and blockhouses. 

Daulac determined to try a new plan. He would not wait for the 
savages till their war-whoop should be heard around the dwellings of his 
countrymen, but with as many choice spirits as he could rally together, 
willing to risk all, he would go forth to battle with the Iroquois. Having 
obtained leave from the Governor, Maisopneuve, to collect such a party of 
volunteers, he at once went to work, and his energy and enthusiasm had soon 
attracted to his leadership sixteen brave comrades ready to follow wherever 
he should lead. 

Nearly all of these had lately arrived from France, and had been much 
disappointed in Cana.da. The continuous confinement in the walled towns, 
the perpetual dread of the savages and the extremes of heat and cold were 
trials they had not taken into account. They would willingly have braved 
any hardship in active warfare ; but to have to endure so much without 
chance of heroic action was intolerable. They, therefore, eagerly seized 



60 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

Daulac's idea of going out boldly to battle, with the chance of distinguishing 
themselves in the service of their country. They were fully aware of the 
terrible risk they ran in going forth so few in number to meet the Indian 
horde ; they showed this by carefully making their wills before setting out on 
their desperate expedition. 

The inhabitants of Montreal looked upon them as a band of heroes ; and 
on a bright morning in the early spring, just as the snow was melting down 
from Mont Royal, and the swollen river was spreading over the surrounding 
country, the people flocked in crowds to the chapel of the Hotel Dieu, to see 
them make what would probably be their last confession, and receive the last 
Sacraments. They were, indeed, a gallant young band, but three of them 
having reached the age of thirty years. It seemed hard that their young 
lives should have to be thus sacrificed to the general good. 

Everywhere throughout the chapel weeping, tear-stained eyes looked 
upon the little group of manly figures, their faces lighted with a spirit of 
heroic exaltation. Some of the elder warriors caught their ardor and begged 
them to wait until the spring crops were sown, in order that they too might 
go against the Indians. But Daulac refused to listen to such entreaties, 
urging that the sooner they hurried to the encounter, the better, since each 
day's delay only gave the Iroquois more time to strengthen their forces and 
bring them nearer the settlements. He was, in reality, anxious to go forth 
with his small band. He had no wish for the presence of any of the older 
men, as in that case he could not be commander of the party, and this was 
his enterprise. It was his cherished desire, not only to protect the settlers of 
Montreal, but, above all, to do some heroic deed that would forever clear 
away the stain from his name. 

Having secured an abundant supply of arms and ammunition for the 
undertaking, and a quantity of hominy, or crushed corn, for food, they took 
a solemn and tender farewell of their friends, who inwardly felt that they 
should never again look upon their brave young defenders. The seventeen 
youths embarked in several large canoes, and began their arduous journey. 
They had had but little experience in the management of these frail barks, 
and so found the work of paddling no easy matter. A week was spent in 



ADAM DAULAa 61 

attempts to pass the swift waters of Sainte Anne, at the head of Montreal 
Island. However, their strenuous efforts were at last rewarded with success, 
and the hard-won experience better enabled them to bend the paddle up 
the difficult Ottawa. Swiftly they toiled across the Lake of the Two 
Mountains and up the river, until the fierce current at Carillon was 
reached. Here they took a brief rest and then began the heavy work of 
poling and hauling their canoes up the rapid torrent. After much severe toil 
they succeeded in passing the rapid, and then quietly paddled along till they 
came within sight of the foaming " Long Saut." These rapids, in which 
Champlain on his first voyage up the Ottawa, almost lost his life, were much 
more difficult to pass than those of either Sainte Anne or Carillon. As they 
gazed at the furious waters boiling and seething around bowlders and sunken 
rocks, they decided that it would not be possible, with their inexperience, to 
ascend them. They kne\v that a large party of the Iroquois were encamped 
on the Upper Ottawa, and that they would have to shoot the rapids on their 
way down ; and they thus thought it best to wait where they were and to 
give the Indians a hot reception as soon as their canoes appeared. While 
debating this matter, they saw just at the foot of the rapid a partially cleared 
spot in the midst of which was a hastily erected palisaded fort. An 
Algonquin war party had hurriedly thrown it up in the previous autumn. 

Worn out as they were, the Frenchmen at once gladly took possession of 
it. After unloading their canoes and hauling them up on the shore, they 
stored their provisions and ammunition in the fort. They were so fatigued 
with the journey that they did not set to work to repair the fort, much 
dilapidated by the winter's storms. Having slung their kettles by the shore 
and partaken of a hearty meal, they wrapped themselves in their blankets 
and lay down for a much needed rest, determining to remain in this fort 
and await the enemy. 

Soon after Daulac had left Montreal, two roving bands of Indians, the 
one an Algonquin party of four, under a chief named Mituvenmeg, the other 
a Huron party of forty led by the famous brave Etienne Annahotaha, came 
to the settlement seeking employment. When they heard of Daulac*s 
expedition, they expressed a strong desire to join him and help him to crush 



62 BUILDEES OF CANADA. 

the common enemy — the Iroqiioi3. The Governor was doubtful about 
accepting the offered alliance. He could trust the Algonquins ; but since the 
destruction of the Huron nation many of the subdued race had gone over to, 
and been adopted by the Iroquois. He feared, therefore, that, should they 
see their old comrades among the foe, they might be tempted to desert 
Daulac. But Etienne Annahotaha, whose courage and loyalty to the French 
cause none could doubt, was so urgent in his solicitations to be permitted to 
help the brave champions of the settlement, that Maisonneuve at length 
consented to give him a letter to Daulac. This chief was an eminently brave 
and wily Indian, who had been nurtured and trained in the wars that had 
swept his nation out of existence. From boyhood he had fought in a 
succession of battles, and no better shot or bolder boatman could be found in 
the American forests or on the bounding streams. Besides being strong and 
courageous he was also diplomatic ; and, but a short time before this, he had 
gained a signal victory over the Iroquois on the Isle of St. Joseph near Lake 
Huron, through the wary shrewdness that characterized him. It is not 
strange that Maisonneuve should have been persuaded to let such an Indian 
leader take his band to the assistance of Daulac. 

These Hurons and Algonquins, knowing that the Iroquois must already 
be on their way down the Ottawa, eagerly bent their ashen paddles and were 
soon in sight of the little fort at the foot of the "Long Saut." Daulac was 
much pleased with this reinforcement, and the hopes of the whole party were 
greatly raised. Scouts were now constantly sent out to give the French 
timely warning of the approach of the foe. From time to time, tidings were 
brought in of their movements, and early one morning several scouts of 
Etienne's band rushed into camp with the news that two canoes were 
speeding down the rapids. Daulac hastily concealed a few of his men ne; r 
the shore, where he thought the Iroquois would land to rest after their 
exhausting labors, giving them orders to be ready to fire on the enemy, and 
if possible, to allow none to escape. 

The ambushed party waited patiently for their victims who were not 
long in appearing, their canoes bounding down the turbulent waters. Daulac 
had chosen the spot for ambush well, for the Iroquois turned their canoes 



ADAM DAULAC. 68 

to the shore just at the point where he expected they would. As they were 
about to land, Daulac's men fired a too hasty volley and some of the Indians 
escaped to the forest before the Frenchmen had time to pursue them or to 
re-load their guns. The fugitives rushed up the Ottawa lo warn their 
companions. Burning for revenge, the whole party straightway broke up 
camp, launched their canoes, and paddled swiftly towards the "Long Saut." 

The French with their Indian allies, after the incident above related, 
set to work to prepare their morning meal. They were, however, suddenly 
interrupted by the tidings that a fleet of almost one hundred canoes was 
already on its way down the Saut. Scarcely had the alarm been given when 
the foremost boat was seen in the distance. For a moment they all stood 
watching the canoes as they came skimming, dancing, shooting down the 
leaping waters, now swiftly gliding over some calm stretch, then rushing with 
race-horse speed towards a boulder, only to be turned aside at the right 
moment by the skillful paddle of the steersman; again plunging down some 
little waterfall and sending the spray in clouds about their prows. 

As soon as they began to reach the smooth waters at the foot of the 
rapids, the keen-eyed and anxious watchers left their kettles and dishes on the 
shore, and rushed into the fort to prepare for the onset. The Iroquois on 
landing saw their slain comrades, and, maddened with rage, charged upon 
the fort, but were driven back with considerable loss. They then endeavored 
to induce Daulac to surrender, holding out favorable terms, but he only 
derided their demands. 

Before renewing the assault, they built a fort in the forest, to which they 
might retreat in case of a second repulse. While thus engaged the 
French and their Indian allies were not idle. Some busily piied their axes 
in cutting down small trees and erecting a double row of palisades. Others 
worked diligently with pick and shovel, filling up the space between the 
two rows with earth, high enough to protect a man standing upright. In 
the earthwork were left twenty loop-holes large enough to allow three men to 
use their muskets with advantage at each. Just as they were throwing the 
last shovelful of earth between the palisades they were called to arms by the 
savage yells of the Iroquois who had completed their fort and were returning 



g4 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

to the attack. This time they were trying a new plan. They had broken up 
the canoes of the besieged, and, setting fire to the pieces of bark, rushed 
forward at full speed with these blazing torches, endeavoring to throw them 
against the palisades, and burn out their foes. But the muskets of the fort 
kept up an incessant fire, and torch bearer after torch bearer fell. Still their 
comrades pressed on, but the hot, close fire was too much for them, and they 
imrriedly retreated, leaving behind them many dead and wounded. 

After a brief rest, they renewed the attack, ably led by a daring Seneca 
Chief, whose spirit so inspired his men that they seemed likely to reach the 
palisades, but a bullet struck the leader and his followers fled. Several of 
the young Frenchmen, desiring to show their courage, and strike terror into 
the hearts of the Iroquois, volunteered to go out and bring in the head of the 
fallen chief. Their comrades stood by the loopholes, and every time an 
Indian showed himself, poured a volley in his direction. Protected by this 
heavy fire, the young heroes succeeded in reaching the fallen chief, cutting 
off his head, and returning to the fort unhurt. With exulting cheers they 
set the head up on the most prominent part of the palisades, right in the face 
of the enraged enemy. This filled the Iroquois with savage determination 
for revenge. Again they rushed forward to take the little fort, but again 
they were repulsed with severe loss. After this third repulse they felt that, 
with their present force, it would be impossible to either destroy or capture 
the little band. 

These Iroquois, when intercepted by Daulac and his men, were on their 
way to join a much larger force of about five hundred fellow countrymen, at 
the mouth of the Richelieu. The two combined bands were to annihilate 
tho French colonists, sweeping Quebec, Three Rivers and Montreal out of 
existence. ♦ 

The besiegers, after debating what would be the best course to follow, 
decided to send a canoe to the five hundred warriors encamped on the 
Richelieu, to ask them to come at once to help them to crush the band 
entrenched in the little fort. After their messengers had departed, a 
continuous fire was kept up by the Iroquois, and every now and then they 



ADAM DAULAC. §6 

feigned a rush on the fort, so as to keep the besieged in a constant state of 
anxiety and weary them out with toil and watching. 

The Frenchmen, in the meantime, suffered much from hunger and 
thirst, cold and want of sleep. The only kind of food they had was hominy 
— poor fare for men constantly at work. In their hasty rush from the shore 
at the approach of the canoes down the Saut, they had failed to bring with 
them any of their large kettles, or any supply of water, and as there was 
none to be had .about the fort, the thirst of the whole party soon became 
almost unbearable. Besides it was quite impossible to eat the dry food alone 
without being almost choked in the effort. 

In despair some of the bravest determined to dare the fire of the 
Iroquois, in order to bring water from the river. Collecting all their 
small vessels, they boldly sallied forth, under cover of the fire of the 
muskets in the fort, and succeeded in bringing in a little water without loss. 
This supply, however, was soon exhausted ; and the Iroquois, who had not 
anticipated this rush to the river, had now posted their men in such a 
position that it was impossible to successfully repeat the attempt. Unable to 
bear the thirst, they went eagerly to work, and dug vigorously until their 
hearts were gladdened by the sight of a little muddy water welling up 
through the soil. 

They had another great misfortune to bear in the desertion of all the 
Huron allies except Etienne Annahotaha. When the Iroquois had 
conquered the Huron nation, many of the latter, as has already been pointed 
out, had been adopted into the various tribes of the five nations. Some of 
these adopted Hurons were with the besiegers, and when they learned that 
many of their fellow countrymen were with the French, they held out 
offers of safety to these, provided that they should desert to the ranks of the 
Iroquois. 

The poor Hurons, starved and suffering, knowing that sooner or later 
they must perish if they remained in the fort, listened to the voice of the 
tempters, and at every fitting opportunity leaped over the palisades and fled 
to the Iroquois, who received them with shouts of joy. At last Etienne and 
the four Algonquins alone remained with the French. Even Etienne's 



SS , > BUILDEES OF CANADA. 

Qephew — La Mouche — went with the rest. This desertion greatly weakened 
the hopes of the little party, now reduced from sixty to twenty. Yet when 
the Iroquois again called on them to surrender, nothing daunted, they 
boldly refused, firm in their intention of holding out to the death. 

About noon on the fifth day after the Iroquois had sent their messenger 
to their brethren at the mouth of the Richelieu, the exulting yells of savagp.« 
were heard afar off in the forest. They came nearer and nearer, until all th; 
woods rang with the demoniacal yells. The French now prepared for the 
worst. They felt that the end was near, but they would not die without a 
heroic struggle. 

Five hundred warriors were thus added to the force attacking the fort, 
and the Iroquois thought that the only thing to be considered was how to 
win the victory with the smallest loss of life. Calling a council, they decided 
to advance cautiously at first, and when near the palisades, to rush forward 
en masse and burst in on the besieged. They advanced accordingly, but as 
soon as any one showed himself, he wag met with a volley. At last the whole 
body made a rush for the palisades, but the French were prepared for it and 
made such havoc in their ranks that they were forced to retire. 

The French had with them heavy musketoons — a kind of small cannon 
which they had not previously used, but had kept loaded in case of 
emergency— and the scattering fire from these was too much for the Indians. 
The Hurons had told the Iroquois of the small number and the weakness of 
the defenders of the fort, but this repulse made them doubt their information. 
Ominous scowls were cast at the deserters, who began to feel that, unless 
the French were soon crushed, they might expect little merey at the 
hands of the enraged and disappointed Iroquois. 

For three days and nights a constant series of attacks, without order or 
plan, was made on the fort. Nothing was gained, and not a few of the 
Indian warriors fell before the unerring aim of the besieged. The Iroquois 
began to look upon these as aided by the Manitou, and many wanted to give 
ap the seemingly useless cod test and return to their lodges. But all their 
bravest warriors cried out against such a course. They would never be able 
to escape the brand of cowardice if they retreated from before this handful 




THE HON. SIR LOUIS HYPOLITE LAFOISn AINt , tSAKX. 
Chief Justice of Quebec. 1853-64 



ADAM DAULAa 67 

of men. No ; they must dare all rather than give up the siege. A council 
was called, and the bravest among them made soul-stirring speeches, calling 
on their brother warriors to uphold the honor of their race. 

Loudest among those bent on continuing the fight, were the Hurons who 
had so lately deserted. It was their only chance for safety. They knew 
that the Iroquois were gloating over the prospect of torturing the men 
making such a gallant resistance, and that if they failed to get these into 
their power they would satisfy their appetite for blood by sacrificing them. 

After the speeches small sticks were tied up in bundles and thrown on 
the ground, and each one willing to risk all, and join in a determined attack, 
showed his readiness by picking up a bundle. Warrior after warrior eagerly 
stepped forward and seized one, while' grunts of approval arose from the 
throats of their companions. Soon nearly all were enrolled, few daring to 
keep back lest they should be regarded as cowards. 

When the task of enlisting volunteers was completed, they went 
ebirnestly to work to plan an attack. All their previous attempts had been 
vain, and to take the fort by assault would cost them many men; they 
therefore decided to remain as much as possible under cover, until they 
should reach the palisade. How to do this puzzled them greatly. At last an 
Indian, more ingenious than his fellows, proposed that trees be cut down and 
large wooden shields made, behind which they could take shelter without 
much danger of being struck by the bullets. His suggestion was acted upon, 
and busily they plied their hatchets. They then made shields by binding 
three or four short logs closely together, and soon the many hands had enough 
ready for the braves who were to lead the attack. After a brief rest, the 
order was given to advance. Slowly but surely the chosen ones led on; while 
protected by them and their shields the rest of the Iroquois followed closely 
behind. 

When the French saw this peculiar, fence-like body advance, they did not 
at first know what to make of it, but they were soon roused from their 
bewilderment, and began a rapid, despairing fire on the wooden wall. It 
was however without much effect; occasionally a shield-bearer would be seen 
to fall, but the place of the fallen brave was quickly filled by those in the rear. 



68 



BUILDERS OF CANADA. 



They did not warer for an instant, and when within a few feet of the 
palisades — casting their shields from them — they leaped forward, hatchet in 
hand, and began hacking and tearing the palisades to force their way into 
the fort. 

The brave little garrison felt that the end had come. They had 
fought like heroes and were now ready to die like heroes. When they had 
undertaken the expedition, they had determined to accept no quarter; now 
they knew they need expect none. Daulac strengthened them by actions and 
words. Eager to repulse the foe, he crammed a large musketoon to the 
muzzle with powder and shot, and lighting the fuse, attempted to throw it 
over the wall. It struck the top of the palisades, and fell back into the fort, 
bursting as it struck the ground. Some of the defenders were blinded and 
wounded by the explosion, and, in the excitement, left the loop holes. The 
Indians, taking advantage of this, began to fire upon them from the outside. 
A breach was soon made through the wall, and the determined warriors 
rushed in, but equally determined Frenchmen met them, knife and a^e in 
hand. Their courage had excited tlie admiration of the savages, and they 
were anxious to take them alive that they might kill them by slow death. 
Orders were given to slay none if possible. Again and again the Iroquois 
crowded into the gap, but Daulac's axe and knife or those of his comrades 
went crashing through skulls or pierced savage breasts till a great heap of 
dead lay about the entrance. At last Daulac was struck down, but his men 
took his place and kept up the fight. 

Maddened by this resistance, and dreading lest the tide of battle might 
yet be turned, the leaders of the Indians gave the order to fire, and a score of 
muskets carried death to the survivors of the heroic party. With fiendish 
yells the Iroquois leaped into the fort in search of scalps. Only three 
Frenchmen had any life left, and these were at once burned before the eyes 
of the heartless crowd. Longing for more blood, and disappointed that they 
had not taken any prisoners, the Iroquois turned for revenge upon the 
Huron deserters ; and some of them were put to death at the stake, with the 
crudest torture. Others they reserved for a like fate, when they should 
reach their villages. Five of these escaped on the journey, and it was from 



ADAM DAULAC. 69 

them that the details of the tragedy reached the ears of the inhabitants of 
Montreal, 

For some weeks before the fight, Quebec, too, had been kept in a great 
state of alarm by rumors of the Iroquois invasion. An Indian, a friend of 
the Iroquois, while being tortured by the Algonquins, at Quebec, told the 
Jesuits of the intended raid, and his tale was substantiated by another party 
of Indians, meeting a like fate. There could be no doubt about the party 
having set out for the invasion of Canada, and, for a time, all was excite- 
ment. However, as nothing further was heard of it, quiet returned at last. 

Then came the tidings of the gallant fight at the Long Saut, and, with 
eyes dimmed with tears, the French learned of the fate of the noble band who 
had so freely given their lives for that of the colony. The terrible lesson 
they gave the Iroquois made the savage host march homeward, not daring to 
face a people that could send out seventeen men so brave as these. 

Montreal mourned her heroes, and for many years, the name of the 
young leader, Daulac, was held in deserved honor. Whatever may have 
been the stain that rested upon liis name, it was completely forgotten in the 
memory of nib iieioic deatij. 



CHAPTER V, 

ROBERT DK LA SALLE. 
By AGNHS MaulE Macha*. 

Srowth of New France Since Champlatn's Days— New England a Rival of New France— 
CoMieelles Undertakes to Explore the Upper St. Lawrence— Canadian Adventnrers Hope 
to Discover a Short Passage to the l^.ast— The Early Training of Robert de la Salle— His 
Arrival in Canada— Receives a lyand Grant Near the Rapids of St. Louis— Seneca Iroqnois 
Visit La Salle — Inspired by Them to Begin Ilis Fanions Explorations— Sets Ont on His 
First Expedition — Discovers the Ohio and tlie Illinois— l''rontenac La Salle's Friend and 
Ally— They Decide to Bnild a Fort at Cataraqui— Frontenac Proceeds in State to Cataraqni 

His Meeting with the Iroquois— The Fort Constrncted— The Mississippi Discovered by 

Joliet and Marquette— News of the Discovery Prompts La Salle to Undertake Another 
Exploring Expedition— Proceeds to France to Interest the King in His Project— P^re 
Hennepin Comes to Canada with La Salle— La Salle Continues His Discoveries— Returns to 
France and Receives a Royal Patent Permitting Him to Continue His Explorations— 
r.egins His Voyages to the Mississippi— His Party Reaches Niagara Falls— Builds a Fort 
and Vessel Above the Great Cataract— His Reverses Begin— The "GritTin," the First Ship 
on Lake Erie, Completed— La Salle Enters Lake Michigan— The "GritTin" Returns to 
Niagara with a Load of Furs— Forebodings of Her Fate— La Salle's Enemies Follow Him 
into the Wilderness— Mutiny Among His Men— Builds Fort CrSveccenr (Fort Heartbreak) 
—Convinced of the Loss of the "Griflhi " — La Salle's Long and Perilous Journey Back to 
Fort Frontenac — Plot to Murder La Salle — Overcomes His Enemies— Ouce More on His 
\Yay to the Mississippi— Reaches the "Father of Waters"— Misfortunes Interfere with 
His Enterprise— Forced to Return to Fort Frontenac — Returns to the Mississippi with 
Renewed Energy — Journeys Down the Great River — Reaches the Gulf of Mexico- 
Ascends the Mississippi and Returns to Canada — His Enemies Triumph Over Him and He 
Sails for luance — Sets out on an Expedition for the Gulf of INIexico — I\Iisfortunes Pursue 
Him — Misses the Mouth of the Mississippi— One of His Ships Wrecked and Another 
Obliged to Leave Him — The Hardships of the Colonists— Ouce IMore in Search of the 
" Fatal " River — Quarrels Among His Followers— The Murder of La Salle. 

NEARLY sixty years had passed away since Champlain had founded his 
little settlement at the foot of the lonely rook of Q.uebec, and bad 
sought from thence to penetrate to the interior of the new continent- 
before a second great adventurer and explorer, as brave and determined a.*^ 
himself, found his way to New France. In tliese sixty eventful years, as we 
have seen, the little colony hud struggled nobly against fearful odds, and 
New Franco might now be said to have a real individual life of its own. 
70 



ROBERT DE LA SALLE. 71 

The promontory of Quebec was by this time crowned by the chateau of 
St. Louis, surrounded by forts, churches, convents and seminary ; while on 
the beach below clustered thickly the shingled roofs of the merchants' and 
tradesmen's establishments. Horses had been brought over for its trafl&c, 
and several hundred sail anchored every year in its harbor, while the 
mineral riches of the region and the fisheries of the river had been somewhat 
developed under the care of the energetic Intendant, Talon, a new ofi:cer in 
the colony. Three Rivers was a fur-trading hamlet, inclosed by a scjuare 
palisade. A chain of clearings and houses extended most of the way from 
Quebec to Montreal, where the fortified wind-mill looked down on the 
compact row of wooden houses along the shore, the Hotel Dieu, and the 
rough stone buildings of the Seminary of St. Sulpice. Beyond Montreal, the 
occasional clearings soon ceased, lost in the mighty forests that reigned still 
unbroken to the east of the present Province of Quebec. Louis the 
Fourteenth, appropriately styled "the Magnificent" had been reigning 
for thirty years, and his "paternal government" had been directing 
emigration to the colony and forcing on its progress with artificial rapidity. 
Another great change had taken place during these sixty years. New 
England had sprung up by the side of New France, and had been growing 
for half a century into a powerful, and, as it proved, a dangerous neighbor. 
Boston and Manhattan (now New York) were as yet little more than villages 
growing up with strong Puritan vigor and vitality. 

There had been an unusually long respite from harassing raids of the 
Iroquois, the scourge of New France and the great drag on her progress. 
But no one could depend on the continuance of this uncertain peace ; and 
i\L de Courcelles, then Governor of the colony, had for some time before his 
resignation, projected an outpost fort somewhere about the junction of Lake 
Ontario with the St. Lawrence. M. de Courcelles had undertaken an 
exploring expedition up the St. Lawrence to look for a suitable site for this 
fort, and one of his last acts as Governor had been to call a council of the 
Indians in order to ask their consent to build what he represented to them as 
simply a "fur depot with defenses." The fatigue and exposure of this 
expedition up the rapids of the St. Lawrence injured the health of the 



72 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

Governor so much that he soon after resigned his office, leaving for his 
successor, the Count de Frontcuac, a strong recommendation to build the 
projected fort, which should hold the Iroquois in check and keep for Canada 
the traffic in furs then in great danger of being diverted to the English and 
Dutch settlers to the eastward. 

As has been shown by the preceding sketches the two main causes that 
built up New France as a colony were the profits of the fur-trade and the 
generous enthusiasm awakened in France for the conversion of the Indians. 
Both objects involved the building of the forts needed to protect traders and 
missionaries, and around these grew up the future towns and cities. But 
still another project had greatly influenced the first explorers and settlers — 
the long cherished idea of finding a short passage across the 
continent to the rich realms of India and Cathay. And this hope still 
attracted to the arduous task of exploring unknown regions, the bravest and _ 
most adventurous spirits of New France. 

Robert Cavalier, afterwards entitled de la Salle, was t^ie most 
remarkable of these adventurers, with the most eventful history, and most 
tragic fate. He was born in 1643, about the time of the capture of the heroic 
Jogues. The son of an old burgher family of Rouen, he received a careful 
education, and early displayed great intellectual ability, having special 
talent for mathematics. He was an earnest and devout catholic, and for a 
time connected himself with the Jesuit Order— a step, which by French law 
deprived him of his rich paternal inheritance even though he afterwards left 
the order. His elder brother, an abbe, was a Sulpitian priest at Montreal, 
and this circumstance seems to have decided his career. With a small 
fortune — ^the capital of an allowance of four hundred livres a year — he came 
to Canada in 1666, a young man of twenty-three, to seek adventure, and win ' 
his spurs in hand-to-hand encounter, with foes as determined and seemingly 
as invincible as the fabled griffins and dragons of fairy tales. 

His destiny and his ambitious projects shaped themselves gradually 
before his mind. He naturally repaired first to his brother at Montreal. 
Canada was not yet an Episcopal see, as it soon after became, under the 
ambitious Bishop Laval, the Hildebrand of New France. The "Seminary 



ROBEKT DE LA SALLE, 73 

of St. Sulpice " still held undisputed supremacy at Montreal, of which it 
was now the seignior, or feudal proprietor, having succeeded to the first 
founders, 

Montreal was still the most dangerous post in the colony, and the priests 
of St. Sulpice were anxious to defend it by a line of outposts along the river 
front Queylus, the superior of the seminary, ofifered La Salle a large grant 
of land close to the rapids of St. Louis, which he gladly accepted. He at 
once laid out the area of a palisaded village, and began to clear the ground 
and erect buildings, remains of which may still be found at Lachine, as 
La Salle's settlement was soon called, in allusion to his dreams of a short 
western passage to China. 

The Seneca Iroquois, who had so terribly harassed the colony, were at 
this time on friendly terms with the French, and some of them came to visit 
La Salle at his new home. Taking a fancy to the adventurous young 
Frenchman, who hid a burning enthusiasm under a veil of almost Indian 
reserve, they told him of a great river called the Ohio, that rose in their 
country and flowed at last into the sea, evidently merging the Ohio and the 
Mississippi into one. He eagerly drank in this welcome tale, for he thought 
that this great unknown river must flow into the " Vermilion Sea," as the 
Gulf of California was then called, and so would supply the long-dreamed-of 
western passage to China. To explore this great river, to find in it an easy 
water-way to the Pacific and the East, and to take possession of this route 
and the surrounding territory for the King of France, was the 
magnificent idea that now took possession of his imagination, and to which — 
somewhat modified — the rest of his life was devoted. 

He went down to Quebec and unfolded his project to the Governor, 
M. de Courcelles, and the Intendant, Talon, who readily gave the endorse- 
ment of letters patent for the enterprise. In order to procure money for the 
expedition, he sold his seigniory of Lachine, and bought four canoes with 
supplies for the journey, for which he also hired fourteen men. He joined 
his forces with an expedition which the Seminary was just then sending 
out to attempt to found a Mission among the heathen tribes of the Great 
West. They set out in July and journeyed together till September, passing 



74 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

the mouth of the Niagara and hearing the distant roar of the great cataract. 
But, near the present city of Hamilton, the priests determined to make 
their way to the northern lakes, and La Salle parted company with them, to 
spend the next two years in exploring alone the interior of the continent to 
the southward. In the course of these wanderings, if he did not reach the 
Mississippi, he discovered at least the important streams of the Ohio and the 
Illinois. But the discovery of the " Father of "Waters " was reserved for two 
other explorers — Louis Joliet and Pere Marquette ; the one a hardy and 
intelligent trader, the other a humble and devoted missionary. 

Meantime, La Salle was still dreaming of the great river and the 
possibilities it opened up. His own discoveries had now convinced him that 
it flowed not into the "Vermilion Sea " and the Pacific, but into the Gulf of 
Mexico. He would take possession for France, of this water-way to the sea, 
with all the trade that would naturally follow it, and would found a greater 
New France in the fertile valleys which never knew the deep snows and 
bitter frosts of Northern Canada. 

Just at this time the energetic and ambitious De Frontenac succeeded 
De Courcelles as Governor of Canada, and La Salle found in him a valuable 
ally. They took counsel together about the new fort, which Frontenac 
proposed to build on the Bay of Quinte, near the foot of Lake Ontario, and 
La Salle was sent to Onondaga, to summon the Iroquois sachems to meet the 
viceroy there for a council. But, meantime, he sent the Governor a map 
which convinced Frontenac that the better site would be the mouth of the 
Cataraqui or Katarakoui, the site now occupied by the city of Kingston, 
and the rendezvous was changed accordingly. 

Frontenac, meantime, evaded the natural jealousy of the Canadian 
merchants by merely announcing his intention of making an armed tour 
westward, in order to impress the Indians, and he invited volunteers from 
the officers settled in the colony. He left the castle of St. Louis early in 
June, 1673, with his staff, a part of the garrison and the volunteers who 
had answered his call ; on his way up the river he enjoyed the courteous 
hospitality of the veteran officers, now living as seigneurs in their primitive 




THE HON. ROBERT BALDWIN, C.B. 



ROBJEKT DI LA SALLE. 77 

log-house chateaux. On his arrival at Montreal he was greeted with all due 
ceremony by M. Perrot, Governor of Ville Marie. 

And now began the most formidable part of his undertaking, that of 
conveying up the rapids of the St. Lawrence the flotilla of a hundred and 
twenty canoes with two flat boats gaily painted in strange designs of red and 
blue to please the taste of the Indians. This ascent involved long and 
toilsome portages or carrying of the canoes through the forest, and great 
labor in dragging the flat boats along the shore. As the men strove to stem 
the fierce current, in water often waist deep, the sharp stones cut their feet 
and the rapid stream nearly swept them away. 

Frontenac, whose strong will and decided tone had a wonderful influence 
over the Indians, took his full share in the labor. He spurred on his men 
in person, sharing their privations and losing a night's sleep from anxiety 
lest the water should have got into the biscuit, but not leaving his post even 
while, amid drenching rain, the boatmen struggled with the furious rapids 
of the Long Sault. But at length the last rapid was safely passed and the 
little fleet glided quietly up the placid labyrinths of the Thousand Islands 
amid the rugged masses of lichen-scarred, pine-crested granite, and through 
narrow inlets that still mirror the intermingled foliage of beech and birch, 
maple and sumach, just as they did when Frontenac's canoes broke their 
glassy calm. 

It was the fourteenth of July, 1673, when the flotilla approached the 
point where lake and river meet, the low forest-clad slope on which now 
stands " the limestone city " of Kingston, whose gray mass of buildings 
overlooks a spacious harbor, commanded by a loftier eminence crowned by a 
stone fort — the successor to Fort Frontenac. Frontenac's expedition, as it 
approached, was arranged with a view to presenting an imposing appearance. 
First came four lines of canoes, then the gaily-colored bateaux or flatboats, 
followed by a long train of canoes — a hundred and twenty in all. These 
carried, besides Indian allies, some four hundred French soldiers, chiefly men 
(^f the famous regiment of Carignan, ofiicered from the French noblesse, and 
sent to Canada seven years before. Frontenac with his staff and the old 
ofiicers who were volunteers, occupied the canoes that followed the flatboats. 



78 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

and then came the rest in two divisions — the Three Rivers canoes to the 
right and those of the Indians to the left. The bright July sun shone on the 
gold-laced uniforms of the brilliant cluster of French oflBcers, with the 
Governor's stately figure in the centre ; and the measured beat of the paddles 
kept time to the strains of martial music, as the flotilla glided on over the 
lake-like river. 

At a little distance from the shore it was met by a canoe containing 
Iroquois chiefs, magnificent in feathers and wampum, accompanied by the 
Abbe d'Urfe, their interpreter. As the old journal of the expedition tells us, 
" they saluted the admiral and paid their respects to him with evidence 
of much joy and confidence, testifying to him the obligation they were under 
to him for sparing them the trouble of going farther, and for receiving their 
submissions at the River Katarakoui, which is a very suitable place to camp, 
as they were about signifying to him." 

The expedition landed and encamped on the shore of the bay 
commanding the outlet of the Catarqui, or Katarakoui, as it was then spelt, 
which winds quietly out from a chain of lakes now forming the " Rideau 
Canal," between banks begirt with marshes and then inhabited only by 
water-fowl, musk-rats and beaver. To the south and west, curving headlands 
and several large islands sheltered what the old journal calls, "one of the 
most beautiful and agreeable harbors in the world." 

At daybreak next morning, July 15, 1673, the French drums beat, 
and the whole force, including Indians were drawn up under arms. The 
Iroquois deputies advanced between a double line of men, extending from the 
French camp to the tent of the Governor, who stood in official state, 
surrounded by his officers. After the usual formula of smoking in silence 
the pipe of peace, the council was opened by Garakontie, a friendly chief, 
who in the name of the five Iroquois Nations, expressed profound respect for 
the Great Ononthio, as they called the Governor. Frontenac replied in the 
grand paternal style which he always used so successfully with the Indians. 
His greeting ran thus : 

"Children — Mohawks, Oneidas, Onondagas, Cayugas and Senecas — 1 am 
glad to see you here, where I have a fire lighted for you to smoke by, and for 



ROBERT DE LA SALLE. 79 

me to talk to you. You have done well, my children, to obey the command 
of your Father. Take courage ; you will hear his word, which is full of 
peace and tenderness. For do not think that I have come for war. My 
mind is full of peace, and she walks by my side. Courage, then, children, 
and take rest." 

Then came the welcome present of tobacco, followed by furthei 
assurances of paternal kindness with gifts of guns for the men, and prunes 
and raisins for .the women and children, and so ended this first formal 
meeting between Frontenac and the grave, impassive savages, in whom he 
was afterwards to find most formidable foes. 

Meantime, the engineer was tracing out the lines of a fort, on a site 
which is now a barracksquare, and the work of cutting down trees, digging 
trenches, hewing palisades, went on rapidly. 

Frontenac, meanwhile, devoted himself to propitiating the Indians with 
the address which, haughty as he was, he could use so well, entertaining the 
chiefs at his table, making friends with the children and feasting the 
squaws, who amused him in the evenings with their Indian dances. After 
four days, during which the forts had pretty well advanced, he called another 
grand council of the Indians, and began his address by exhorting them to 
become Christians. He then hinted at his power to enforce obedience to his 
commands, and threatened chastisement in case they should molest his 
Indian allies. After again assuring them of his present friendliness, he 
explained that he was now building, as a proof of his affection, a storehouse 
from which they could be supplied on the spot with all the goods they 
needed, without the inconvenience of a long and dangerous journey. After 
warning them not to listen to mischief-makers, and to trust only " men of 
character like Sieur de la Salle," he ended by asking them to entrust him 
with a number of their children to be educated at Quebec. His address 
seemed to give general satisfaction, and the Iroquois, three days later, 
departed tor their homes from whence they afterwards sent him several 
children, important to the French as hostages for their parents' good conduct. 

Frontenac began also to send his expedition home in detachments, while 
he himself, with his guard, remained to receive and address in the same way 



80 • BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

another deputation of Iroquois from the villages north of Lake Ontario. In 
reporting to the French Minister — Colbert — the successful accomplishment of 
his object, he suggested that, while the fort at Cataraqui, with a vessel then 
in progress, would give to the French control of Lake Ontario, a second fort 
at the mouth of the Niagara would command the whole chain of the upper 
lakes. Most of all, he congratulated himself on having "impressed the 
Iroquois at once with respect, fear and good-will," and secured at least a 
lasting truce from their long harassing raids. 

During the time occupied in this expedition events were occurring, far 
to the southward, which were destined materially to influence the future of 
the new settlement. 

While Frontenac was pushing his way up the furious rapids of the St. 
Lawrence, the canoes of Marquette and Joliet were gliding down the placid 
waters of the majestic Mississippi. For this long sought river was now 
actually discovered. 

Soon after Frontenac's return to Quebec, the canoe of Joliet followed 
him with the good news, and though it was upset at the foot of the Lachine 
Rapids, he himself escaped to carry to the Governor the important tidings. 
La Salle's interest was, of course, intensely excited, chiefly by the 
representation that it was possible to go in a bark from Fort Frontenac, on 
Lake Ontario, to the Gulf of Mexico, only on© "carrying-place" being 
mentioned, at what we now know as Niagara Falls. 

La Salle immediately conceived the idea of realizing his long cherished 
project of opening up a water-way to the southern sea, and establishing a 
line of military and trading posts along the whole length of this watery 
highway of lake and river. He would thus protect the intended route and 
take military possession, in the name of his royal master, of a country whose 
extent and richness even he had hardly any real conception. 

In many respects La Salle was well-fitted for such a magnificent 
enterprise. His daring energy, determined will, indomitable perseverance 
and the dauntless endurance of his strong mental and physical constitution, 
seemed to supply the qualities most needed for realizing the dream that fired 
his imagination. But his burning enthusiasm was veiled under a shy . 



ROBEKT DE LA SALLE. 81 

reserve, which he could not overcome, and which, by depriving him of the 
personal influence possessed by Champlain, probably made all the difference 
between success and failure in his tragic career. In Frontenac, however. 
La Salle found a discriminating and helpful friend ; and he now received 
from the Governor the command of the new fort, where he was to reside 
while maturing his plans, and preparing to execute them. 

But the new fort had jealous enemies among the traders of the colony, 
who indeed had already been clamoring for its demolition. It was therefore 
thought advisable that La Salle should go to France, in 1675, to submit his 
project to Louis himself, carrying letters of recommendation to the king's 
trusted minister — Colbert. He was honored with a gracious reception at 
court, and was raised to the rank of the untitled noblesse as the Sieur de la 
Salle. He received also on certain conditions a royal grant of Fort 
Frontenac and the adjacent lands now included in the county of Frontenac. 

Satisfied for the present with this success, La Salle returned to Canada, 
and his friends, elated with his good fortune, helped him to fulfil his offer of 
paying back to the king the ten thousand francs which the fort had cost. 
He was accompanied to Canada by a friar named Hennepin, who was to take 
an active part in the work of exploring the still unknown wilderness. 
Though his gray robe with its peaked capote, girdle of rope and pendant 
crucifix, as well as his bare sandaled feet, marked him as a Franciscan monk, 
he was possessed by a thirst for adventure and discovery, which irresistibly 
attracted him to the Canadian Mission and then to the new outpost of Fort 
Frontenac, which he made his headquarters. 

La Salle at once set to work energetically to fulfil the remaining 
conditions of his grant. "Within two years he had replaced the original 
wooden fort by a much larger one, defended by stone ramparts and bastions 
on the landward side. It inclosed, besides the storehouse, a row of cabins of 
squared timber, inhabited by the garrison, a well, a mill, a forge and a 
bakery. Its walls were armed with nine small guns, and the garrison 
consisted of a dozen soldiers, two officers and a surgeon, while there were 
besides about fifty laborers, artisans and voyageurs, or coureurs de bois, a class 
of men almost as savage as the Indians themselves. 



82 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

A large extent of land was soon cleared and a village of French 
colonists quickly grew up in the shadow of the fort, while a little 
farther on was a cluster of Iroquois wigwams. Close by was the chapel of 
the R6collet friar, Louis Hennepin and his colleague, Luc Buisset. The 
cleared meadow around the settlement was often dotted with the wigwams of 
the Indian traders, and alive with the busy life of the encampment and 
the Indian games and dances in which the Frenchmen would often join to 
relieve the monotony of their wilderness life. 

If La Salle had only sought riches, he would have been satisfied with 
the yeariy profits of twenty-five thousand livres gained by trading at 
Fort Frontenac. Here, too, he could indulge his love of solitude, and rule 
like a king over his little realm. But he had never meant Fort Frontenac 
to be anything more than a step toward industrial colonies in the rich 
south-western wilderness, and a commercial route down the Mississippi to the 
Gulf of Mexico. 

In 1677, he again sailed for France, and laid before Colbert a 
representation of the discoveries he had made and the beauty and fertility of 
the country to the south and west of the Great Lakes, with its riches of 
game, and its advantages of climate ; a country which the English colonists 
were already coveting for themselves. His memorial was considered, and in 
May, 1678, he received a royal patent authorizing him to proceed in the 
labor of discovery, and to build within five years as many forts as he saw 
fit ; and giving him besides, a monopoly of buffalo hides. 

Having secured several large loans by the aid of his brothers and 
relatives, who "spared nothing to enable him to respond worthily to tie 
royal goodness," he sailed again from Rochelle, taking with him about thirty 
men and two lieutenants — La Motte and Henri de Tonti, an Italian officer 
who became his most faithful follower. At Quebec they were met by Father 
Hennepin, who had meantime been making long journeys among the villages 
of the Iroquois — by canoe in summer and on snow-shoes in winter — when he 
and his companion camped out at night in holes dug in the snow, keeping a 
fire burning to keep them from freezing. 



KOBBRT DB LA BALLS. 83 

A small bark of about ten tons lay at Fort Frontenac, intended for 
cruising on the lake, though canoes were more generally used, and La Salle's 
canoe-men were known as the best in America. La Motte and Hennepin, 
with sixteen men, embarked in it on a gusty day in November, leaving 
La Salle and the rest of the party to follow them westward. For shelter 
from the northwest gale, they ran close along the shore, and finally took 
refuge in a river, probably the Humber, near the present site of Toronto. 

After a night of hard tossing on the lake, they succeeded in entering 
the Niagara River, and landed on the eastern shore, near the site of Fort 
Niagara, then occupied by a Seneca village. Hennepin ascended the river 
in a canoe till the fierce strength of the rapids stopped his further progress. 
He then took to the shore and pushed through the wilderness till he, first of 
Europeans, beheld the great cataract of Niagara Falls, descended to the foot 
of the cliff, and even penetrated under the fall. 

La Motte immediately began to build a fort on the river, two leagues 
above the point of landing. He was soon joined by La Salle who had been 
nearly wrecked in a storm off the Bay of Quinte. He had gone first to the 
great village of the Senecas beyond the Genesee, and had succeeded in 
securing their consent, which La Motte had vainly sought before, to the 
building of a fort at the mouth of the Niagara, and of a vessel above the 
cataract. 

La Salle soon met with his first misfortune, the total wreck of the vessel 
in which he had come, caused by the disobedience of the pilot. His men, 
too, housed in the little palisaded fort below the heights of Lewiston, were 
difficult to manage ; and La Motte, disabled by inflammation of the eyes, 
had to return to Fort Frontenac. The building of the vessel went on, 
however, despite the difficulties of carrying all the lading of the small bark 
twelve miles through the forest, from its anchorage below Lewiston to the 
point where the new vessel was in progress on the shores of Lake Erie. The 
keel was soon laid, and the work of the carpenters advanced rapidly, despite 
some hostile demonstrations from the jealous Indians. 

La Salle, meantime, marked out the foundations of two block-houses on 
the present site of Fort Niagara, and called the post after the name of one of 



84 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

his great patrons, Fort Conti. In February, needing to go to Fort Frontenac. 
he walked all the way thither on snow-shoes, through the snow-bloeked forest 
and over the frozen lake. A dog drew his baggage on a sled ; and for food 
the party had only parched corn, which ran ou,^ two days before they reached 
Fort Frontenac. 

It was August when he returned with three friends to Fort Niagara. 
Before that time the new vessel had been launched, with firing of cannon 
and great rejoicings, and anchored weli out in the lake, out of reach oi 
Indian attacks. It was named the "Griflin" — ^the crest of Frontenac — and 
La Salle used to say " that he would make the " Griffin " fly above the 
crows;" by which he meant the unfriendly Jesuits, who from a desire to 
have the newl}^ explored territory under their own influence, and jealous of 
all other pioneers, were among the most determined foes of his enterprise. 

At this very tinie his enemies had circulated reports so injurious to his 
credit, representing all his property in Now France as having been seized by 
his creditors, that it was necessary for him to lose no time in setting out on 
his expedition. On the seventh of August, therefore, after a parting salute, 
the "Griffin " spread her white wings on the blue waters of Lake Erie, which 
had never borne a sail before. She cruised swiftly up the lakes and passed 
into the strait of Detroit, where the prairie to the right and left supplied 
abundance of game, including a number of bears whose flesh furnished 
excellent food. 

On Lake Huron the " Griffin " was nearly wrecked in a gale, but 
reached safely St. Ignace, where there was a trading post and a Jesuit Mission. 
Here the expedition landed, and La Salle, in a scarlet, gold-embroidered 
mantle, knelt at mass amid a motley concourse, in the little bark chapel of 
the Ottawa village. He found there four out of fifteen men whom he had 
sent on before to prej^are the Illinois Indians for his coming, and who had 
nearly all proved unfaithful to their trust- 
Early in September he passed on into Lake Michigan and anchored at 
Green Bay. Being exceedingly anxious to raise money at once he unhappily 
determined to send back tlie "Griffin" to Niagara, with a valuable freight 
of furs collected by an advance party, while he and his men pursued their 



ROBERT DE LA SALLE. 87 

voyage in four canoes in which they carried a heavy cargo, inchiding a forge 
and tools for future U3e. But a sudden equinoctial storm swooped down 
upon them, and they were nearly lost in the darkness, while the violence of 
the gale, of two days' duration, made them tremble for the safety of the 
" Griffin." 

With difficulty they made their way along the shore of the lake against 
constant storms, which all but swamped their heavy-laden canoes. The 
Indians they met proved generally friendly, though La Salle had to take 
decided measures to protect the party from depredations. But he was 
warned against advancing among the Illinois Indians, as it seemed that his 
unscrupulous French enemies had purposely roused their hostility by 
instigating the Iroquois to attack them. 

He reached safely the mouth of the St. Joseph, which he called the 
Miamis, where he was rejoined by Tonti and his men, who had remained at 
Sainte Marie looking for the deserters from the advance party. There was as 
yet no news of the " Griffin," which had now had plenty of time for her 
return voyage from Niagara, and La Salle had a dark foreboding as to her 
fate, but whatever betided, he must push on to his goal. 

Early in December the party re-embarked and the canoes began to 
ascend the St. Joseph in what is now the State of Michigan, on their way to 
the sources of the Kankakee, one of the heads of the Illinois, which course, 
in turn, would lead them to the Mississippi. 

After losing their way in the forest, while seeking the stream, and being 
nearly burned to death while sleeping in a wigwam of reeds, they made their 
way over desolate snow-clad plains to the Kankakee, on which they re-em- 
barked, following its winding course through the great prairies of Indiana, 
where the half-starved party occasionally caught a buffalo. They passed on 
into the valleys of Illinois, and, near the present village of Utica, they found 
the empty bark lodges of a great Indian town whose inhabitants were absent 
on their winter hunt. Near Peoria Lake, however, they found a village of 
inhabited wigwams, and had a peaceful interview with the people who were 
at first terrified by the appearance of the eight armed canoes. La Salle told 
these Illinois Indians of his intention to build a great wooden canoe in which 



tS BUILDEKS OF CANADA. 

to descend the Mississippi and bring them needed goods ; and promised to 
help them against the dreaded Iroquois if they would allow him to build a 
fort among them. 

His footsteps were dogged, however, by a Missouri chief, sent by his 
malicious enemies to poison the minds of the Illinois against him, by 
representing him as an Iroquois spy, a suspicion of which he ere long 
succeeded in disabusing them. Poison of a more material sort, too, seems 
to have been tried to shorten his career, as it had already been tried at Fort 
Frontenac 

Six mutinous members of his band, including two of his best carpenters, 
deserted him here — a desertion that cut him to the heart, and made him feel 
that in addition to the difficulties of his enterprise, he had scarcely four men 
whom he could trust. It is no wonder that, when, in January, he built his 
new fort on a hill above the Illinois River, he called it Fort Cr^vecoeur — 
Fort Heartbreak. In addition to other vexations, he was now convinced of 
the loss of the " Griffin " which had probably been sunk by her treacherous 
pilot. 

As the lost ship had on board not only a valuable cargo of furs, but also 
the rigging and anchors of the vessel to be built for the descent of the 
Mississippi, it was necessary for La Salle to return all the way to Fort 
Frontenac, if he were to persevere in the enterprise. Happily, before his 
departure, he received information from friendly Indians that the Mississippi 
was not beset with dangers and obstacles, but was easily navigable to the sea, 
and that the tribes on its banks would give him a kind reception. 

Therefore, after seeing the new vessel on the stocks and well on its way 
to completion, he sent P^re Hennepin to explore the Illinois, while he set out 
on his dreary journey to Fort Frontenac over the still frozen wilderness ; 
though, as it was March, the streams were in some cases open. Partly by 
snow-shoes, partly by canoe — sometimes obliged to leave canoes behind and 
to make a new one to cross a swollen stream — often waist deep in ice-cold 
water, or pressing through thickets or marshes, or climbing rocks loaded 
with necessary baggage, they retraced their way to Lake Michigan. At Fort 



ROBERT DE LA SALLE. 8^ 

St. Joseph they found the two men left to make a vain search for the 
" Griffin," and sent them back to join Tonti at Fort Cr^vecoeur. 

After many delays caused by the difficulties of the way, they reached 
the log cabin on the banks of the Niagara, where the ** Griffin " had been 
built, and where some of the men had been left. In La Salle's case 
misfortunes indeed " never came single." Here tidings of a new calamity 
awaited him. In addition to the loss of the " Griffin," and ten thousand 
crowns in her cargo, a ship coming to him from France, with goods to the 
value of twenty-two thousand livres, had been wrecked at the mouth of the 
St. Lawrence, and a band of men hired for service in Europe, had been 
either detained by the Intendant, or led by reports of his death to return. 

Leaving his three exhausted followers at Niagara, La Salle, still 
undaunted, pushed on through the floods of spring rain to Fort Frontenac, 
after his perilous journey of a thousand miles — '* the most arduous journey 
ever made by Frenchmen in America ; " and that is saying a great deal. 

Here there was little but trouble in store for him. His agents had 
robbed bim, his creditors had seized his property, and the rapids of the 
St. Lawrence had swallowed up several richly-laden canoes. He hurried on 
to Montreal, astonishing both friends and foes by his arrival, and succeeded 
within a week in getting the supplies they needed for the party at 
Crevecceur. But just as he was leaving Fort Frontenac two voyageurs arrived 
with letters from Tonti telling him of the desertion of nearly the whole 
garrison, after destroying the fort, and plundering it, and throwing into the 
river all the stores they could not carry off. The deserters, twenty in 
number, had also destroyed Fort St. Joseph, carried off a store of furs from 
Michillimacinac, and plundered the magazine at Niagara. Some of them 
had taken refuge on the English side of the lake, while the rest were on 
their way to Fort Frontenac, with the design of killing La Salle himself. 

La Salle was always ready for an emergency. He embarked at once in 
canoes, with nine of his trustiest men, lay in wait for the plunderers as they 
came down the shore of the lake, and succeeded in intercepting them all, 
killing two, compelling the rest to surrender, and taking them as prisoners to 
Fort Frontenac. All liis work had now to be begun anew ; but however the 



90 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

af^fiumulated disasters may have tried his courage, he could not give way to 
despair. He must at once go in search of Tonti, and if possible save him 
and his handful of men, as well as the half-finished vessel on the stocks. 
Taking with him the necessary material, his Lieutenant, La For^t, and 
twenty-five men, he again journeyed westward, taking, this time, the shorter 
route of the Humber, Lake Simcoe and Lake Huron through a hostile 
country, where he could with difficulty procure provisions from the jealous 
Indians. At the ruined Fort Miamis, on the St. Joseph, he left five of his 
men with the heavy stores and hurried on, his anxiety for Tonti being 
increased by the rumor of a threatened invasion by the Iroquois, 

As he and his men passed through the wide prairies, now alive with 
bufialo, they secured abundance of food wherewith to relieve Tonti and his 
party should they succeed in finding him. Approaching the great Illinois 
town they found ghastly proof that the Iroquois invasion was no mere 
rumor, for it was indeed a city of the dead. The invaders had evidently 
found it deserted by its living inhabitants and they wreaked their malice on 
the corpses they had disinterred and mangled, leaving them a prey to the 
wolf and the vulture. Farther on they passed six deserted camps of the 
flying Illinois, and on the opposite shore, the traces of encampments of the 
pursuing Iroquois. They reached Fort Cr^vecoeur at last, to find it ruined 
and deserted ; and though the vessel on the stocks was not destroyed, its 
nails and spikes had been drawn out, and on one of its planks were inscribed 
the words : ''Nous sommes tous sauvages, 1680." The date showed plainly 
enough that however savage the destroyers had been, they were not, at any 
rate, Indian savages. 

Pursuing their course down the stream of the Illinois, the little band in 
three or four days reached its mouth and glided out on the placid waters of 
the broad river. La Salle was at last on the long dreamed of Mississippi. 
But the present load of anxiety left little room for exultation. On an 
over-hanging tree he hung a hieroglyphic letter for Tonti, should he pass that 
way, representing himself and his men in their canoes, holding the pipe of 
peace. His companions ofiered to accompany him should he choose to go on 
to the sea ; but he would not abandon the men he had left nor discontinue 



ROBERT DE LA SALLE. 91 

his search for Tonti. On their way back, paddling by night as well as by 
day, they saw the great comet of 1680, from which Newton discovered the 
regular revolution of comets round the sun. La Salle, unlike the ordinary 
observers of the time, noted it, not with superstitious dread, but with purely 
scientific interest. 

Ascending towards Lake Huron by a difierent branch of the river, the 
party came upon a rude bark cabin, in which La Salle's quick eye discovered 
a bit of wood cut by a saw, a proof, he thought, of its recent occupation by 
Tonti and his party. 

Through a severe snowstorm of nineteen days' duration, accompanied 
by severe cold, the wayfarers at last reached Fort Miamis, which had been 
restored by the men left there, in addition to their work of preparing timber 
for a new vessel for the lake. Here La Salle spent the winter, laying plans 
for colonizing the valleys of the Illinois and the Mississippi, and for inviting 
the Western tribes to make a defensive league under the French flag, which 
should gradually change a savage battle-ground into a civilized Christian 
community. It was Champlain's old scheme under new conditions ; but as 
before it had no stable foundation. At first, however, he won over a number 
of allies from the Illinois and other tribes, and after calling a grand council 
and exhorting them to become " children of the Great King," he set out in 
May, 1681, to revisit Fort Frontenac. 

At Green Bay, on Lake Michigan, he at last found Tonti with the Friar 
Membre. After many stirring adventures, having nobly espoused the cause 
of the friendly Illinois, and acted as mediators between them and the 
Iroquois, they had safely reached this point on their way home. Each had 
much to tell ; but La Salle's tale of misfortune was told with such cheerful 
calmness that the friar regarded with astonishment and admiration his firm 
front under calamity, and his determination to pursue his aim, when " any 
one else would have thrown up his hand, and abandoned the enterprise." 

Paddling their canoes a thousand miles farther, La Salle again reached 
Fort Frontenac, where he had to do his best to retrieve his embarrassed 
affairs. He went to Montreal and succeeded in getting new credit by parting 
with some of his monopolies. Then he once more set out with a band of 



W BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

thirty Frenchmen and more than a hundred Indians, for the south-western 
wilderness. His laden canoes once more paddled slowly along Lake Huron, 
and were beached at last on a gray November day, at Fort Miamis. Weakened 
by the desertion of some of his band he pursued his way down the Misissippi 
in canoes, holding peaceable interviews with the Indian tribes on the shore, 
till at last on the sixth of April, his canoes glided down the three mouths of 
tie Mississippi and out on the shoreless expanse of the Gulf of Mexico. Here 
a wooden column was prepared bearing the arms of France and inscribed with 
the words : " Louis Le Ghrand, Roy de France et de Navarre rSgne : Le Neumhme 
Avril, 1682" Then in presence of his few weather-beaten Frenchmen, 
he formally took possession of the whole country south of the AUeghanies, 
under the name of Louisiana, for the King of France. A volley of musketry 
and the chanting of the grand hymn of the Vexilla Regis celebrated this 
addition to new France, which made it the nominal possessor of nearly the 
whole North American continent 

At last, then, after almost incredible toil and suffering, La Salle had 
accomplished this part of his scheme. The work of colonization had yet to be 
begun, but there were many lions in the way. 

As the expedition made its way up the Mississippi, contending with 
famine and hostile Indians, La Salle was seized with a dangerous illness 
which detained him so long that it was September before he joined Tonti at 
Michillimacinac. Had he succeeded in building his vessel for the descent he 
could have sailed on to France with a valuable cargo ©f buffalo hides. As it 
was now too late to go to France for the money he needed, he .and Tonti 
proceeded to entrench themselves for the winter near the Indian town on a, 
high and bold rock overlooking the Illinois and its fertile valley, calling his 
new post by the favorite name of Fort St. Louis. Round its w^ooden ramparts 
assembled, for protection against the Iroquois, some twenty thousand Indians 
of various tribes, including four thousand warriors. Here La Salle seems to 
have enjoyed one of his last gleams of happiness, rejoicing in this earnest of 
success, and seeing in imagination, a great and prosperous colony growing up 
to possess and subdue the wilderness. 



ROBERT DB LA 8ALLB. 93 

But, in order to maintain his influence over the Indians, he must have 
arms to defend them and goods for merchandise, which must at present be 
brought from Canada. He knew the bitterness of his enemies, but in 
Frontenac he had an invaluable friend. But now a new blow fell on the 
ill-fated La Salle. His enemies had intrigued for even the recall of Frontenac 
on the ground of alleged charges against him. His successor was Lefebvre de 
la Barre, a weak and avaricious old man, who soon made common cause with 
La Salle's enemies. His misrepresentations reached Louis himself at 
Fontainbleau, who was led to believe that La Salle's discovery was useless 
and his enterprise even mischievoua. 

While La Salle was still in happy ignorance at Fort St. Louis, the 
Governor cut off his supplies, detained his messengers, and even said at a 
conference with the Iroquois who were being urged by the English and Dutch 
traders to attack Western tribes, that they were welcome to plunder and kill 
the adventurous discoverer. This malicious persecution culminated in the 
Governor's seizure of Fort Frontenac, on pretense that some of the conditions 
of the grant had been unfulfilled. The threatened invasion of the Iroquois 
which spread terror through the region of the Illinois did not take place, but, 
with the Governor his enemy, La Salle's situation was intolerable; and 
bidding a final farewell, as it turned out, to Fort St. Louis and to Canada, he 
sailed on his last voyage to France. 

In Paris his friends and patrons gained him access to Louis the 
Fourteenth, and in a private audience he unfolded his discoveries and his 
great designs. It happened opportunely for him, that France was then 
desirous of checking the Spanish pretensions to exclusive possession of the 
Gulf of Mexico, and as his proposals exactly fell in with this desire, they 
found great favor at Court. It would seem as if La Salle's usually calm 
judgment had been blinded by the exigencies of the situation and disturbed 
by the numberless calamities that had befallen him, for part of the scheme 
submitted to the king was a proposal to lead an army of fifteen thousand 
Indians against the Spaniards of Mexico. This proposal was seriously 
entertained by Louis the Fourteenth and his ministers, who had no means of 
knowing the difficulties in the way. 



94 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

La Salle received all the power he asked for, and was expected to perform 
what he proposed, while the Governor was ordered to restore all the 
possessions so unjustly seized. Four vessels, instead of the two he had asked 
for, were given to La Salle for his voyage to the mouth of the Mississippi, and 
a numerous body of soldiers and colonists for the proposed colony was 
mustered at Rochelle. 

In July, 1684, after many delays, the little squadron set sail. This opens 
the last and most painful chapter of La Salle's tragic career. It would seem 
as if the long-continued nervous strain had told at last, even on his strong^ 
self-contained nature. His imperious and haughty manner had always been 
one of the drawbacks to his success, but now he seemed to become suspicious 
and vacillating as well as exacting and impatient. He appeared unable to 
make up his mind as to the course before starting, and there were unhappy 
bickerings between him and the naval commander De Beaujeu, a somewhat 
irascible old seaman tenacious of his dignity, while La Salle could not endure 
a divided command. Misfortune as usual seemed to pursue him. At St. 
Domingo, where they halted, he was seized with a dangerous illness 
aggravated by the news of the loss of one of his smaller vessels. 

When the expedition reached the Gulf of Mexico, La Salle unhappily 
missed the point where the Mississippi by several passages flows into the Gulf. 
Uncertain as to the longitude of the river he passed it by some four hundred 
miles and halted instead on the shore of Matagorda Bay. Here he landed his 
men, and thinking he had reached his goal, prepared to establish the colony. 
To complete the tale of misfortune another vessel was wrecked on a reef and 
ere long the large gunship, the " Joly," being out of supplies was obliged to 
sail away. 

When La Salle finally discovered his mistake, he found it necessary to 
form a temporary establishment for the colonists at the mouth of the Texan 
river Lavaca, where the colonizing party were lodged in huts and hovels, 
while many of them fell victims to disease and death under the burning 
tropical sun. 

In the following October, La Salle with his brother, the Abb6 and an 
armed party set out in quest of his, " fatal river," but in March he and his 



ROBERT 1)K I.A »ALJ.B. 97 

mon returned exlwvustod, aftor fruitless wnndorinos and ndviMituros with 
suvagG tribes. This v.-iin |\)urnoy added lo l.lio K)ss of Ins hist vossri thn^w 
him into anolhor daiiiMMous iUnesa. I>ut. (mi liis nn-o very, still undatiiUod ho 
di'tiM-nnnod to make another attempt to liud hia way baek to Canada by the 
Mississippi and the Illinois to proonre snccour for the destitute colony, lie 
set out again in April, UISC), with about twenty of bis men litted out in 
«;aniients patched with much care, or borrowed from thost> who remained in 
the fort. They were obliged, however, to return without olUcv result than l\\o 
exploring of a magnilicent country, and a visit, to a powerful and reniarkabK> 
tribe of Indians, called the Ceuis, long since extinct. 

\jn Salle's colonists, now reduced to forty-tive, had grown heartsick and 
ini|)ali(U\t of their long exile and iniprisonnieut in the little palisaded 
villa<\(>; and the only hope of deliviM-ance lay in another attempt to proiuie 
aid iVoui Canada. But again La Salle was prostrated by illness — ih)ubtK\ss 
the outi'ome of the many heart-breaks of his life. As soon as his strength 
was restored, however, he pre[)ared once more to turn his steps northward. 
With about half of the survivors — some twenty-live men — La Salle for the 
last time left the fort, after a solcnui, religious service, and a sad and 
atleetionate farewell of the little party left behind. 

La iSalle had long endured imdaunted "the slings and arrows of 
ontiageous fortuue." One other, which released him from all, was in store 
f^ir him. 

Tlu> career of heroic perseverance, whieh neither savage nature, nor 
illuivss, nor Indian barbarians, nor the persecution of bitter enemies had lu>en 
able to turn aside, was to be priMuatnrely cut short by a wretched qu.inel 
among his own t'oUoweiU In Mareli. as he and his party were eneamiuHl in 
the northern part of Texas, a few of his mon set out on a hunt in;'; i>\pedition. 
A dispute arising about the division of tl\e game, tlu'ce of the men were 
nmnlered by the rest, who then saw no chance of safety fron\ ]ninishment 
except by the death of their bravo leader. 

On March 19, 1637, Jja Salle, uneasy at the long absence of the hunters, 
sot out in search of them. As he walked on with 1^'riar Ponay through the 
Te.\au wilderness, the spiritual world seemed to be uppiM'uiost in his thoughts. 



yO BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

" All the way," wrote the friar, " he spoke to me of nothing but matters of 
piety, grace and predestination, enlarging on the debt he owed to God, who 
had saved him from so many perils during more than twenty years of travel 
in America." Suddenly he Roemod av^rwhelmed by a profound and 
unaccountable sadness. Recovering from this his keen eye noticed two eagles 
circling in the air as if attracted by some carcass. He fired his gun as a 
signal to any of his men within hearing, and immediately after one of tlie 
conspirators appeared and answered his inquires with ostentatious insolence. 
La Salle rebuked him and unconsciously drew near an ambuscade from which 
a traitor called Duhaut, fired on him and the dauntless leader fell dead. 
Thus by the bullet of a treacherous assassin, was closed the tragic career of 
one of the most heroic spirits of a heroic age, who against all odds, had pursued 
for twenty years an object that seemed ever destined to elude him just as he 
was on the point of achieving success. The recital would seem almost too sad 
but for the light of heroic endurance that shines upon his story. 

The assassin Duhaut, by a righteous retribution soon after met a similar 
death. La Salle's companions at length succeeded in making their way to 
the faithful Tonti, who still occupied the rock of St. Louis on the Illinois. 

The brave and generous Tonti, as chivalrous as La Salle himself, full of 
grief for his leader, made an ineffectual attempt to rescue the wretched 
survivors of the colony on the Gulf of Mexico who eventually fell victims to a 
murdering band of Indians in the total absence of succour which the 
" Magnificent " Louis could so easily have afforded to those ill-fated victims 
of his ambition. 

Fort Frontenac figured repeatedly in the troublous times which were now 
hanging over New France, and was the scene of an infamous act of treachery 
by the Governor De Denonville, which provoked the terrible massacre of 
Lachine, 

La Salle fell in the midst of unfulfilled designs, but, where he had gone 
before, others were to follow and reap the result of his labors. Some twenty 
years later under happier auspices Le Moyne d' Iberville founded the present 
State of Louisiana, which still stands in its largely French character, a 
monument to the heroism and devotion of its first French explorers. 



CHAPTER VI. 

COUXT DE FRONTENAC. 

Frontenac tlie Most Consp!cuous Figure in the Histoiy of New Prance — Of a Noble Basque 
Family — A Soldier at Fifteen — Marries Aune de la Grange-Trianon — At the Siege of 
Candia— Appointed Governor and Lieutenant-General of New France — Hopes to Build a 
Great Empire on the Banks of the St. Lawrence — Makes Radical Changes in the Govern- 
ment of Quebec and Canada — Censured by the Home Government for Introducing 
Changes — His Quarrels with the Intendant and the Clergy — A Friend of La Salle's — His 
Quarrelsome Nature Forces the King to Recall Him — The Marquis de Denonville Lays 
Waste the Country <rf the Senecas — The Iroquois Retaliate with the Massacre of 
Lachine — Frontenac Sent to Canada to Save the Colony — Plans the Conquest of New 
England — Three War Parties Sent by Him Against the English Settlers — Their Success 
Gives New Life to New France — New England Plans the Invasion of Canada — The 
Expedition Against Montreal a Failure — Sir William Phips Lays Siege to Quebec — 
Frontenac's Vigorous Resistance — Phips' Fleet Hopelessly Defeated — The People of 
Quebec Do Honor to Frontenac — Rewarded by the French King — Plans to Drive the 
English from North America — Sends an Expedition Against the Mohawks — Its Success 
Gains the Confidence of the Western Indians — Personally Leads an Expedition Against 
the Iroquois — Returns to Quebec — Old Quarrels Renewed — Death of Frontenac, November 
tS, 169S— Mourned by All Classes in the Colony — Character of Frontenasw 

OF all the governors of New France, Louis de Buade, Count de Frontenac, 
stands out on the pages of history as the most conspicuous figure. 
He had a strangely mixed character ; he was arrogant, over-bearing, 
tyrannical and yet possessed of such force, and energy, and wisdom that he 
did more than any other man during the time of French occupation in 
America to establish French rule on a firm basis. He came to Canada at a 
critical time in her history; a time when on the one hand a sparse 
population settled along the St. Lawrence was in danger of annihilation from 
the savage Indians of the Six Nations, and when the struggle which was 
ultimately to end in the conquest of Canada by the British was in its initial 
stages. He managed to avert the danger from the Iroquois and to postpone 
for many years the loss of New France. It was his striking and magnetic 
personality that enabled him to £ace the difficult situation he found in 

»9 



100 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

Canada, and had there been a Frontenac in Quebec wTien Wolfe came against 
the rocky fortress it is doubtful if the British troops would have succeeded in 
capturing the city. Certainly Frontenac would never have allowed his 
troops to face in a pitched battle the veterans composing Wolfe's force. 

This illustrious gOA^ernor was an aristocrat of an ancient and noble 
Basque family. His father held a high position at the court of Louis XI II, 
and the king became Frontenac's god-father and had him christened Louis 
after himself. From his earliest years young Frontenac showed a passion for 
the life of a soklior, and at the age of fifteen was sent to the seat of war in 
Holland to serve under the Prince of Orange. He saw much fighting and 
before his twenty-third year had distinguished himself in a number of 
battles and sieges. His services were appreciated by his king, and, wdien 
twenty-three years old, he was made a colonel in the regiment of Normandy. 
He continued in the field and was several time§ wounded and in one 
engagement had an arm broken. When he was twenty-six years old he was 
raised to the rank of Marechal de Camp (brigadier-general). He does not 
seem to have seen much active service after attaining this high military 
rank, but returned to Paris where he enjoyed a season of peace and spent his 
time in entertaining and being entertained. 

It was during this time of peace that Frontenac met Anne de la 
Grange-Trianon, the beautiful daughter of one Sieur de Neuville. He fell 
passionately in love with this girl, and, after a romantic courtship, which was 
opposed by the father and friends of his fiancee, they were married in 16-18. 
From the beginning, the marriage seems to have been an unhappy one. It 
could hardly have been otherwise ; they were both strong characters and 
Frontenac's over-bearing manner and passionate bursts of temper could not , 
fail to make a woman of character and intellect unhappy. 

For twenty years but little is known of the life of Frontenac. During 
these years he entertained extravagantly, and on a small income endeavored to 
keep pace with the most fashionable grandees of Paris. In 1669, Venetian 
ambassadors came to the court of France asking aid against the Turks. For 
several years the Turks had been attacking Candia in overwhelming numbers, 
and the Venetians felt that without the aid of France it would soon fall. 



COUNT DE FRONTENAC. 101 

They requested forces, and likewise that a French officer should be placed in 
command of the troops operating against the Turks. The task of conducting 
these operations would need both courage and energy, and it speaks well for 
Frontenac that he was chosen for this important command. Candia fell, but 
so ably did Frontenac conduct the campaign that lustre was added to his 
name, and he was recognized as one of the ablest soldiers of his time. 

Three years after his return from the Candia expedition he was 
appointed Governor and Lieu tenant-General for the king in the colony of 
New France. According to writers of the period, his extravagance had left 
him deeply in debt and his domestic life was intensely unhappy. It was 
said that the king gave him this appointment " to deliver him from his wife 
and afford him some means of living." This can hardly be true, for 
although Frontenac and his wife were not congenial companions, during the 
whole course of their lives they seem to have had much respect for each 
other, and while he was in the wilderness of Canada Madame Frontenac was 
his most active partizan in the court of France and looked keenly after his 
interests. 

Frontenac was not a young man when he set out for Canada. He had 
reached his fifty-second year, but was still youthful, fiercely passionate and 
possessed of a stubborn will. He was a courtier, and it seems strange that such 
a man should have been sent to rule over the vast wildernesses of Canada ; 
but Frontenac was able to conform to his environment, and indeed from the 
moment he saw the shores of Canada he loved the country. The vast River 
St. Lawrence with its thickly wooded banks attracted his eye, and when he 
reached the lofty rock of Quebec a second Gibraltar, he held it as a fitting 
place to be the capital of a great empire and resolved within himself to 
firmly base such an empire. 

As soon as he landed in Quebec he at once began to look after the 
interests of the colony. He did not wait for reports with regard to the 
country from the officials under him, but examined for himself every detail 
of the government, and anxiously inquired from all classes as to the needs of 
Canada. He conversed with traders, with hunters, with fishermen, and was 

soon thoroughly familiar with the land he had come to govern. One of his 

7 



102 BUILDERS OF CANADA, 

first acts was to convoke a Council at Quebec and administer the oath of 
allegiance. He had his own ideas as to how Canada should be governed. 
The three orders of the State no longer assembled in France, but Frontenac 
thought that some such form of government might be adopted with 
advantage in Canada and he determined to establish these orders in the New 
World. The Jesuits and Seminary priests formed the first order, a few nobles 
and several officers served for the second, and the merchants and citizens 
for the third. It looked for a time as if the clergy, the nobles, and 
the commons were to have a voice in the ruling of Canada. He formed 
the members of the Council and the magistrates into a distinct body. 
When everything was ready for his new form of government the Jesuits 
lent him their church, and in it, on the 23rd of October, the three 
estates were convoked with suitable pomp and splendor. On this occasion 
Frontenac delivered a paternal and eloquent address to his children, for such 
he already began to consider the people of Canada, and after administering 
the oath of allegiance the assembly was dismissed. 

Quebec was the centre of the life of the colony, and in Frontenac'i 
opinion it was necessary to have a firm municipal government in the town. 
He proposed to establish one on the model of some of the French cities of 
his time. He ordered the public election of three alderman, of whom the 
senior should act as mayor ; having done this he proposed with the assistance 
of the chief citizens to draw up a body of regulations for the government of 
the iOwn. He went a step further in the direction of popular government ; 
he ordained that a meeting should be held every six months for the 
discussion of public questions. Popular government was a thing frowned 
upon by the king of France, and some of the leading officials recognized that 
Frontenac's action would prove offensive to the French court. Talon, the 
Intendant, refused to attend the meeting, and when Colbert, the great 
Minister, heard of Frontenac's action he warned him against popular 
government, and pointed out that the meeting of the States-General had not 
been permitted for many years in France ; and in a diplomatic way and with 
mild censure, forbade him to establish popular governmeuk 



COUNT DE FRONTENAa 103 

From the beginning of his rule Frontenac had a succession of quarrels 
with the leading men in the colony. He was a man, by culture, travel and 
experience, far superior to his confederates, and he was impatient of their 
opposition to his wishes. He was on the eve of a quarrel with Talon when 
the Intendant was recalled to France. However, he managed to become 
embroiled with the clergy at a very early date in his rule and began that 
antagonism to the Jesuits which ended only with his death. -He took a lively 
interest in the Indians, and put forth every effort to civilize them. He had 
a genuine affection for the red men, and this affection was returned ; he called 
them children and they looked up to him as a father. His motives in 
treating the Indians generously were not altogether unmixed, as he was, like 
all other men in the colony, interested in the fur-trade. The clergy were not 
above trade, and Frontenac bitterly complained that the Jesuits thought more 
of "beaver-skins than of souls." 

It was during his first term that he was attracted towards La Salle and 
it was due to Frontenac's admiration for that dauntless discoverer that the 
great West and the Mississippi became known to the world. The monopoly 
granted La Salle, as has already been seen in that distinguished discoverer's 
life, embroiled Frontenac with Perrot, the Governor of Montreal, and the 
priests of that community. The quarrel was a bitter one, and echoes of it 
reached the court at France, but the king and his minister showed 
marvellous forbearance with Frontenac. 

They took measures, however, to curb his power. Up to this time the 
appointment and removal of councillors had rested, in the absence of the 
bishop, solely with the Governor. It was now ordained that the councillors 
should be appointed by the king himself, and this naturally served as a 
check on Frontenac. 

After the recall of the Intendant Talon, Frontenac for a time ruled 
alone, but Bishop Laval and another Intendant, Duchesneau, arrived in New 
France. Bishop Laval was as little capable of bearing opposition to his 
wishes as was Frontenac He had quarreled with all the previous governors 
under whom he had served, and was not long in the country before he was 
at daggers-drawn with the new governor. His quarrel was a righteous one ; 



104 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

Frontenac, for gain, was interested in the trade in brandy, and to this 
nefarious business Laval would lend no countenance. 

Frontenac quarreled, too, with the Intendant about the honors and 
precedence at church and in religious ceremonies. Bitter letters passed 
between the colony and old France, and in due time these quarrels were 
settled only to give way to others. Frontenac was warned to be careful, but 
he could brook no opposition, and banished without just cause two 
councillors, Villeray and Tilly, and the attorney-general, Auteuil, from 
Quebec. This was too much for the king, and he wrote an angry letter to his 
governor saying that, but for the pleading of Frontenac's friends and the 
assurance that he would act with more moderation in the fature, and never 
again fall into like offence, he would have recalled him, Colbert wrote him 
with equal severity. 

Frontenac, however, could not keep out of quarrels and he was soon in 
the midst of one brought on by the fur-trade in which he was interested. 
Duchesneau was at the head of one faction in the country and the Governor 
at the head of another. The whole colony took sides and letters denouncing 
Frontenac and Duchesneau reached the Minister. Duchesneau bitterly 
accused Frontenac of using his office for his own aggrandisement and of 
abusing the great trust the king had confided in him, Frontenac on the 
other hand accused Duchesneau of insubordination and falsehood. So fierce 
was this party-quarrel that blows were given and on several occasions swords 
were drawn in the streets of Quebec. It got to such a pitch that, at length, 
the king decided to recall both Frontenac and Duchesneau. He could not 
have done otherwise ; and yet it was a sad day for the colony when 
Frontenac sailed from Quebec. He had begun the work of reconciling the 
Indians and had done much to win the wavering ones to the French. By his 
removal the good work he had initiated was lost, and the colony was to pass 
through a bloody trial, but in the hour of supreme need Frontenac was to 
return to save it. 

When Frontenac was recalled to France an Indian war was threatening 
the colony and La Barre, the new governor, a soldier inexperienced in the 
warfare of America, was not the man to cope with the situation. At this 




GUY CARLETON, LORD DORCHESTER 



COUNT DB FRONTBHAC 107 

time, the English of New York were, in the interests of trade, stirring up the 
Indians against the French. La Barre determined to march against the 
Iroquois and made preparations for the invasion of their country. In 1684, 
he left Montreal and with a considerable body of men advanced as far as 
Fort Frontenac ; here, he patched up a truce with the Iroquois which was in 
no way a credit to France. He was a failure ; the government recognized it 
and recalled him. 

The Marquis.de Denonville was the next governor. He found that the 
truce made by La Barre with the Iroquois had in no way altered their 
attitude towards the colony ; they still were threatening war and were 
backed up by the English. Denonville determined to march into their 
country and to punish them in such a way that they would no longer be a 
menace to New France. Scarcely had he taken over the reins of government 
when he acted in a most treacherous manner toward the Indians, and it was 
largely due to this treachery that the colony was threatened with 
annihilation. He collected large forces and advanced into the country of the 
Senecas. The Indians were unable to cope with his army and fled before 
him. Their villages were burned and their crops and hidden stores of grain 
destroyed ; he, however, succeeded in killing or capturing but few of the 
savages. His work done he returned to Montreal leaving a legacy of hate in 
the hearts of the Iroquois against the French which was to end in the 
massacre of Lachine. In 1689, the Iroquois were in a position to retaliate 
for Denonville's invasion, and with a strong force of experienced warriors 
they invaded Canada. They fell upon the settlement at Lachine and 
massacred men, women and children. For three weeks they remained in 
the vicinity of Montreal burning, pillaging and murdering, and then 
returned to their own country leaving the colony in a weak and helpless 
condition. 

Meanwhile Frontenac was at the court of France, out of favor and with 
an empty purse. The king, however, was changing towards him ; the weak 
administrations of La Barre and Denonville made him realize that a mistake 
had been made when Frontenac was recalled. With all his faults, with all 
his stubbornness, he was the only man apparently ca{)able of grafting with 



108 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

the Canadian sitj^ation, and even before the news of the Iroquois invasion of 
Canada had reached France, the king had resolved to restore him to the 
governorship of the provinces. Frontenac was now seventy years old, but 
despite his years he was still strong and active and fearlessly undertook the 
task allotted him. On his appointment he went to Rochelle where two ships 
of the Royal Navy awaited him and sailed for Quebec. 

On the voyage out his mind was busy planning a campaign against the 
English ; they were the prime cause of the evils that had befallen New 
France and he determined, if possible, to separate the Indians from the 
English, and thus pave the way for the conquest of New England by the 
French. When he reached Quebec the country was still terrorized by the 
dreadful news of the Lachine massacre and the inhabitants hailed their old 
Governor as their deliverer. All the citizens turned out to meet him and he 
was conducted through the city with pomp and display, but there was no 
time to delay ; the upper country needed him and he made haste to reach 
Montreal. Here the inhabitants were in an abject condition and the late 
Governor Denonville was as terrified as the rest. Frontenac proceeded to 
Lachine and saw the awful desolation made by the Iroquois butchers, and 
his heart was filled with anger against those who had incited them to invade 
Canada. He learned that Denonville had ordered Fort Frontenac to be 
destroyed. He was anxious to save his old fort and sent countetmanding 
orders, but before they arrived the place had been partially blown up and 
deserted. 

His presence worked a marvellous change in the situation ; the people 
took heart and the Indian allies who had been holding aloof prepared to join 
forces with the French now that Frontenac was once more in authority. He 
saw that to gain the full confidence of the Western Indians it would be 
necessary to perform a deed that would re-establish respect for the soldiers of 
France, and he was not long in hitting upon a plan that would at once cause 
suffering to the English and win the respect of the Indian allies. 

Knowing that the English would suppose that the great barrier of 
snow-drifts and ice bound rivers raised by the winter storms between 
themselves and the French gave them comparative safety he determined to 



COUNT DE FRONTENAa 109 

take them by surprise. For this purpose he called together his best marksmen 
and tried soldiers and planned with some of the friendly Indians a threefold 
invasion on the u nsuspecting foe. 

Frontenac permitted no delay in getting up the parties which were to 
work such havoc on his enemies and at once began at Montreal, Three Rivers 
and Quebec to fit them out for their winter march. That mustered at 
Montreal was the first ready and at once started for the South. They had a 
terrible march and the men were almost exhausted when they reached the 
Mohawk River on whose banks Schenectady was built, but the sight of this 
town cheered their drooping spirits, and at midnight, when the inhabitants — 
honest Dutch people under English rule — who had been feasting during the 
day were fast asleep, the Indians and coureurs de bois fell upon them, and 
spared no one from the grey-haired grandsire to the babe nestling at the breast. 
At last their leaders commanded them to cease, but not before death and 
desolation had visited every house. This war-party then successfully beat a 
retreat to Montreal. 

The second war-party left Three Rivers about the end of January with 
the intention of attacking Salmon Falls, a small settlement on the line 
separating New Hampshire from Maine. When the place was reached a 
midnight attack was made. The town was unguarded and the French had 
no opposition in their work of death and plunder. A few of the inhabitants 
escaped and a large party of Englishmen set out in pursuit of the retreating 
enemy, but due to the heroism of Hertel, the French leader, they were unable 
to destroy or capture the marauding band. The third war-party set out from 
Quebec and leisurely journeyed southward for four months. Its destination 
was Fort Loyal on Casco Bay. At first the party consisted of one hundred 
and ten men, but on their frequent halts they had been joined by many others 
eager to take vengence on their English enemies, and as they drew near Fort 
Loyal they numbered between four and five hundred. A vigorous resistance 
was made, but at length the commander of the Fort, Captain Sylvanus Davis, 
was induced to surrender on condition that mercy should be shown to the 
garrison, and that they should be allowed to retreat to the nearest English 
village. The promise was not kept, and when the inhabitants filed out of the 



110 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

fort the Indians fell upon them with tomahawks and scalping knives and 
slew many, even women and children, with brutal torture. 

About the middle of June this last of the three famous war-parties 
arrived in Quebec with Davis and four more prisoners, the sole survivors of 
the massacre. 

Such was Frontenac's method of teaching the EngUsh a lesson. These 
war-parties had been sent out to show that the arm of the French colony was 
still strong to smite. It had been intended by these pitiless deeds to strike 
terror into the hearts of their enemies and to give life and vigor to those at 
home. In the latter Frontenac succeeded, even beyond what he had expected. 
From Quebec to Montreal the joy-bells rang out and those who were beginning 
to long for Old France felt that they might yet found a worthy New France in 
America. Frontenac was the man of the hour — all alike did honor to him 
for his quickness of action. 

The havoc wrought by the three war-parties roused in the English 
colonies a spirit of revenge, and they determined to make a united effort to 
crush their enemies to the north. For this end they felt, that beside their 
own strength, they would require the assistance of the motherland. A swift- 
sailing ship was sent to England to explain their troubles to the home 
government and ask for men, money and vessels. But England had neither 
the means nor the inclination of helping her children. Nothing dismayed 
the colonies went on with their preparations for the invasion of Canada. Not 
having sufl&cient means to fight their enemy to advantage they decided t(j do 
it at their enemy's expense, and Sir William Phips was sent from Boston 
with seven vessels to ravage Acadia. 

After capturing Port Royal (Annapolis) and despoiling other villages 
along the coast of the Bay of Fundy, he returned to Boston laden with spoil, 
and so removed the chief difficulty that had delayed the invasion. Prepara- 
tions were now hurried on, as the English were anxious to invade 
Canada before the following winter. A two-fold invasion, by land 
and water, was planned to strike both the strongholds of the French 
possessions at once. The land force, under generals Winthrop and Schuyler, 
was to march on Montreal by way of Lake Champlain, while the fleet, sailing 



COUNT DB PRONTENAa 111 

round the coast, was to glide swiftly up the St. Lawrence and surprise 
Quebec 

The expedition on Montreal was a total failure, InsuflBcient arrange- 
ments had been made for providing the necessaries of life, and the troops 
found themselves almost within sight of the enemy's country with but little 
food or clothing and no means of obtaining them. The Iroquois, too, failed 
to give the expected help, and they were compelled to beat an inglorious 
and hasty retreat to Albany. 

The fleet under Sir William Phips and Major Walley, had at least the 
glory of reaching its destination. It looked tolerably imposing with thirty-two 
ships, great and small, the largest carrying forty-four guns, the smallest being 
a fishing smack. Phips had under his command about twenty-two hundred 
men, including sailors ; an exceedingly large force when we consider how few 
people then inhabited New England, and that thirteen hundred men were 
with Winthrop and Schuyler marching on Montreal. 

Although the force was large it could not be called strong. The 
soldiers were principally farmers and fishermen, quite unaccustomed to the 
use of warlike weapons, and the commanders of the vessels were ship- 
owners and ship captains who had neither had experience in the management 
of artillery, nor in the use of small arms. The militia ofiicers were recruited 
from the merchant's desk and the plough, so they had yet to learn the art of 
war. The lesson they received may have helped them to train their children 
to be true and gallant soldiers as they afterwards proved themselves, both in 
helping the motherland in her wars with Canada, and in their own successful 
blow for independence. This fleet, with its untutored warriors, sailed from 
Nantasket on the ninth of August, 1690, followed by prayers for success from 
the pulpit of every church and the hearth of every home in New England. 

What was now the state of the French colonists and what had they been 
doing all this time ? They had long been struggling against the continual 
attacks of the hostile Indians. The outljdng villages could never feel 
perfectly at rest, and the inhabitants were often aroused by the terrible 
whoops of the painted savages, or by the shrieks of some of their dying 
friends. Tidings of farmers slain and houses plundered and burnt were 



112 BUILDERS OP CANADA. 

constantly being brought into the forts. This weakened and depressed the 
French colonists, and Froutenac, the energetic old Governor, determined to do 
all in his power to gain the friendship of the Indians. Succeed he did, but 
not without difficulty. He even went so far as to lay aside his dignity and join 
them in one of their warlike dances, outdoing the most energetic of the red 
men in their own sport, much to their amusement and admiration. 

Frontenac's success in treating with the Indians and the success of the 
three war-parties had for the time made the colonists feel much safer than 
they had done for years. France was now embroiled in a European war ; 
and, like England, could render no assistance to her offspring ; so the two 
colonies were left to fight it out alone on the American continent. If there 
was any advantage the English had the best prospects, both in numbers and 
resources, but an invading army fighting in a foreign land has not the 
inspiration of that which is defending hearth and home. This fact perhaps 
made up for the difi^erence in numbers. Then, too, the French had been more 
constantly engaged in war and this had given their soldiers the experience of 
veterans. 

Scarcely had Montreal rejoiced over the news that Winthrop and Schuyler 
had retired to Albany when Frontenac, at Montreal, was informed that a fleet 
was advancing on Quebec. At first he could scarcely believe it, but his doubts 
were dispelled when he learned that an Indian had brought the tidings all the 
way from the shores of Maine. This Indian, an Abenaqui, discovered from a 
woman captured by his tribe that a large fleet had shortly before left Boston 
for Quebec. Being friendly to the French he determined to warn them of the 
impending danger. There was but one way of doing this, and that was by 
speeding on foot across the couiitry from his Abenaqui home to Quebec. 

As the danger threatening Montreal was removed, Frontenac, the hope 
of the Canadians, at once started for Quebec, and on the way met a messenger 
sent by his lieutenant, Prevost, to warn him that the fleet was reported at 
Tadousac. Frontenac, before leaving Montreal had ordered two hundred 
men to follow him speedily to Quebec, but on receiving the news of the 
nearness of the enemy he at once sent back an order to De Calli^res, Governor 
of Montreal, to hurry on to Quebec with all the men he could collect. 



COUNT DK FRONTENAa 113 

With all possible speed he pushed his way to the rescue, eager to reach 
the rocky fortress before the foe, and on his way he ordered the comnaanders 
of the various forts to send on their men after him. To his delight he 
succeeded in reaching his destination before any of the enemy's vessels could 
be seen from the citadel. When the anxious watchers in Quebec saw him 
approaching their hearts beat with renewed hope, and as soon as he 
reached the shore he was met with a royal welcome ; the warm-hearted 
Frenchmen, forgetting their usual outburst " Vive le Roi," met him with 
" Vive le Frontenac," and showed their joy by a most boisterous salute. 
As the grey-haired old warrior toiled up Mountain Street — the steep path 
leading from the lower town to the upper town — he felt the youthful blood 
surge through his veins, and as he thought of the threatened attempt to storm 
Quebec — his Quebec — his eyes flashed and his lips were firmly pressed 
together with the determination to leave his bones on the rocky heights before 
he would permit the Fleur-de-lis to be lowered before the Union Jack of hated 
England. 

There was no time to be lost. With the greatest alacrity he at once 
began examining the fortifications. Prevost, although he had heard of the 
approaching fleet but a short time before, had everything fairly well secured. 
The city gates had large beams strung across them, and were barricaded with 
casks of earth ; palisades had been erected along the St. Charles ; extensive 
entrenchments had been thrown up, and from every available point the 
black-lipped cannon loomed over the river. Frontenac was much pleased 
with the work done, and in two days after his arrival had everything in 
readiness to meet his foes with a strong resistance. 

But what had Phips been doing while Frontenac was thus employed ? 
He had now been in the St. Lawrence for some days, whereas the run from 
Tadousac to Quebec should have taken but a day or two. With great lack of 
foresight the fleet had left Boston without anyone on board who knew the 
Gulf or River St. Lawrence, and so they had literally to feel their way along 
it with the lead, thus giving the French ample time to strengthen their 
fortifications and crowd in men from other forts for their protection. Besides 
this great slowness of movement, from ignorance of the channel, Phips wasted 



114 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

much time in holding councils of war and in forming and issuing rules foi 
the government of his men. Had he reached Quebec at the right time, he 
would have had a very easy task to take it, as he had learned from a 
Frenchman captured on the way. For at the time when he arrived at 
Tadousac, Quebec was garrisoned with but two hundred men ; and, besides 
being badly fortified, its cannon were nearly all dismounted. His enforced 
delay, however, gave the French time to work a transformation ; and now, 
when he had anticipated that everything would be easy he had to face an 
energetic host, a well fortified rock, and, above all, the brave old warrior 
Frontenac, who put life and energy into every one with whom he came in 
contact. 

Slowly, but surely the fleet advanced; frequently harassed by the 
skirmishing attacks of the villagers who, at every opportunity, showed their 
loyalty to France by shouldering their guns and giving the foe a passing shot. 
Even the priests in some of the villages closed their missals and handled the 
gun to good effect. Sometimes the ships were compelled to turn out of their 
course by coming in contact with some unseen shoal or reef At last they 
came in sight of Quebec, and vessel after vessel dropped anchor in the basin 
just below the grand old rock. The sailors and rustic soldiers were filled 
with misgivings as they gazed at the frowning heights and saw everywhere 
preparations to resist them. They began to think that perhaps their prisoner 
had deceived them, and even the sanguine Phips, as he looked up to the Fleur-de- 
lis staunchly waving its white folds over the Chateau St. Louis on the summit of 
the cliff, felt his hopes fall many degrees. At any rate he saw that the French 
did not lower their flag at his approach. However, he had succeeded once 
before, at Port Royal, by a request to surrender, and so he determined to try 
to get into the citadel without waste of powder or loss of men. He had the 
wrong man to deal with. Frontenac had struggled long to keep the French 
colony together despite the biting colds of the Canadian winter — so hard upon 
the pleasure-loving French nature — and the constant attacks of brutal 
savages ; and he was not disposed to surrender at the request of Sir William 
Phipa. 




ROBERT DE LA SALLE, FAMOUS EXPLORER 



COUNT DE FRONTENAC. 117 

Shortly after the fleet had anchored, Phips despatched an officer under a 
flag of truce to Frontenac. As soon as the boat touched shore the officer was 
bhnd-folded and led to the chief. The French did all in their power to 
impress him with their strength, leading him over a very circuitous route* 
and dragging him over barricade after barricade, much to the delight of the 
mirth-loving inhabitants, ready to enjoy a good practical joke even at such a 
time as this. As he passed through the garrison the soldiers made as much 
noise as possible by clash of weapons and heavy tramp of feet ; and by the 
time he reached the council chamber he was ready to tell his comrades a 
very different tale from the one they had heard from the prisoner. When he 
was ushered into the council chamber, men in uniforms glittering with gold 
and silver lace met his unbandaged gaze, and the haughty expression of their 
faces made him feel ill at ease. 

At last he found strength enough to give Phips' letter to Frontenac, 
who ordered it to be read aloud in French for the benefit of all. The letter 
was a brief demand for an unconditional surrender. Silently the assembled 
French officers listened with an expression of growing rage on their 
countenances, as they heard themselves reviled and their possessions 
demanded in the name of King William and Mary. The closing paragraph 
ran : " Your answer positive in an hour, returned by your own trumpet, with 
the return of mine, is required upon the peril that will ensue." 

The very mention of the names — ^William and Mary — so hated by 
Frenchmen of that time, made Frontenac's blood boil, and when the English 
envoy handed him his watch, stating that as it was then ten o'clock Sir 
William Phips would expect his reply by eleven, he burst into passionate 
words of indignation. 

" I will not keep you waiting so long. Tell your general that I do not 
recognize King William ; and that the Prince of Orange, who so styles 
himself, is a usurper who has violated the most sacred laws of blood, in 
attempting to dethrone his father-in-law. I know no King of England but 
King James. Your general ought not to be surprised at the hostilities which 
he says the French have carried on in Massachusetts ; for, as the king, my 
masteri has taken the King of England under his protection, and is about to 



118 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

i eplace him on his throne by force of arms, he might have expected that His 
Majesty would order me to make war upon a people who have rebelled against 
their lawful prince. Even if your general offered me conditions a little more 
gracious, and if I had a mind to accept them, does he suppose that these 
brave gentlemen" (his councillors) "would give their consent and advise me 
to trust a man who broke his agreement with the governor of Port Royal, or 
a rebel who has failed in his duty to his king, to follow a prince who pretends to 
be the liberator of England and the defender of the faith, and yet destroys the 
laws and privileges of the kingdom and overthrows its religion? The divine 
justice which your general invokes in his letter will not fail to punish such 
acts severely I" 

The envoy stood silent and trembling for a few moments after Frontenac 
had ceased speaking and them timorously requested the French Governor to 
write his reply to Phips. 

" No ! " burst forth the haughty old governor, " I will answer your 
general only by the mouths of my cannon, that he may learn that a man like 
me is not to be summoned after this fashion. Let him do his best and I will 
do mine I " 

After these words the envoy was blind-folded and led back to the boat 
awaiting him. As soon as he reached the admiral's ship he related what 
had passed between him and Frontenac ; and, moreover, filled Phips and 
his officers with very exaggerated ideas of the strength of the defences, which 
he knew only from the rough experience he had had in his blind passage 
through them, and the warlike sounds that had saluted his ears. 

Just as the twilight was fading into darkness, joyous shouts blended with 
the frequent firing of distant but approaching guns, as though of a jubilant 
people, were carried to the ears of the English. The whole city seemed 
roused. Men, women, and children could be heard shouting for joy. " What 
does it mean ? " was passed from lip to lip on board the fleet, and many 
faces blanched as they heard the tumult increase rather than diminish. 

Granville, their prisoner, at once guessed at the truth. He knew the 
upper country had been alarmed and that probably the tumult betokened 
the arrival of forces from Three Rivers, Montreal and other points along the 



COUNT DE PBOKTEHA& ^^^ 

St. Lawrence, filling the inhabitants of Quebec with joy and hope. It was 
even so. De Calli^res, the Governor of Montreal, had not been idle, but, by 
forced marches, had brought every available man to Frontenac's assistance 

After another day's delay on the part of Phips, owing to unfavorable 
weather, the siege of Quebec began in earnest. Major Walley landed with 
about thirteen hundred men near the mouth of the St. Charles. Frontenac, 
owing to his increased numbers, felt that he had nothing to fear from the 
landing of the troops and did not oppose them until they had formed on thfe 
muddy banks of the river. But as soon as they attempted to advance 
French sharpshooters kept up a continuous fire from sheltered positions. 

This was unexpected by the English, and threw them into disorder ; 
however, after a short baptism of fire, they showed the stern front that 
Englishmen have always opposed to danger, and calmly waited their 
commander's order to charge the enemy out of their position. At last they 
received the command, and, with the impetuous daring of the Briton, rushed 
on the enemy's position — ^visible only by the puffs of smoke rising from 
behind trees and rocks. 

Shot after shot was poured into their ranks as they advanced, but nothing 
daunted, they continued their charge until the French turned and fled. 
When they had reached a safe distance they halted, took shelter, and renewed 
the attack. Walley, seeing it would be useless to charge them again, called 
back his men and encamped. He had sufiered great loss of men, and was 
moreover disheartened by seeing how useless it was to attempt anything from 
the landward side. 

While Walley was doing his poor best on land, Phips dropped down 
in front of the citadel and began bombarding it. A steady fire of cannon 
was kept up from both the fleet and the rock, without doing much harm to 
either party, until darkness came on, when the firing ceased only to be begun 
next morning. 

On the second day of the fight the boldness of the English gave their 
foes an opportunity of doing good work. The French gunners were experienced 
soldiers, who had been through more than one campaign ; many indeed 
having learned their mihtary tactics in old France. Sainte-H^Une, who had 



120 BUILDERS OP CANADA. 

SO distinguished himself in the march on Schenectady, took charge of one of 
the guns that played on the admiral's ship, and made almost every shot tell. 
All over the fleet torn sails and falling spars told how effective was the 
answer from the " cannon-mouths " that Frontenac had spoken of. A lucky 
shot carried away the flag of the admiral's ship much to the delight of the 
French. 

The English guns were not doing anything like the work of their 
opponents. The soldiers, at any time poor marksmen, were exceptionally so 
under this heavy fire, and many of their shots fell harmlessly in the water, 
or, striking the cliff, rolled back in seeming derision. The expedition set off 
ill-supplied with powder, and now the effect of it was felt. The gunners were 
given but scanty supplies, and had to use them with the utmost care ; so 
much so that many of the balls did not pierce the houses on which they 
fell. On the whole the fleet had done but little injury to Quebec. 

Poor Walley and his men had all this time been suffering terribly. The 
cold Canadian October weather had settled down upon them, and after their 
retreat, they were forced to realize more and more the task they had 
undertaken. As they lay in camp on the muddy shore they passed a sleepless 
night owing to the intense cold. In the morning all about them seemed 
turned to ice, and their wet clothes were in many cases frozen to the ground. 
Shivering they arose, made another feeble attempt to advance, only to be 
repulsed. Small-pox broke out among them cutting off many. Never was 
there a more hopeless spectacle ; a large fleet many miles from home, with 
but little ammunition, facing an insurmountable rock, without any regular 
plan of attack ; a large army gathered on the shore, not knowing what to do 
next, suffering physically and tormented by the constant fire of sharpshootersv 

Phips, though not a man of good judgment was wise enough to see that 
the expedition was a total failure, and so decided to recall Walley and give 
up the attack. He disliked this course extremely. He had proved himself 
a man of remarkable courage, and as he paced the quarter-deck of his vessel 
amid the steady hail of bullets he was the admiration of all who saw him. 
But it was useless to waste his men in the struggle ; the ammunition was 
aim«rt gone, and before many days the St. Lawrence would be bridged with 



COUNT DB FRONTENAa 121 

ice. Boats were put ashore and Walley and hia men re-embarked in the 
utmost confusion, leaving behind five pieces of artillery. An attempt was 
afterwards made to recover the guns, but the French kept up such a heavy 
fire on the party detailed for this duty that it had to be abandoned. 

When the inhabitants of Quebec realized that the enemy had withdrawn, 
they burst into shouts of exultation. Cheer after cheer ascended from the 
rocky height, and amid the joyous fire of the guns and the cheers of the people, 
could be heard the name of their preserver Frontenac. Even those who 
hated him now joined with the others in doing him honor. They had much, 
indeed, to thank him for. But for his prompt action in ordering the troops 
to hasten into the fortress, from the various points along the St. Lawrence, 
and in permitting no delay in strengtheping the fortifications, the English 
would have found what they expected — an easy prey. The French had 
another cause for rejoicing. They had begun to fear a protracted siege, and 
as many frightened refugees had crowded in from the surrounding country, 
starvation had already begun to stare them in the face. 

The English withdrew behind the Island of Orleans to repair their vessels 
before starting on their homeward voyage. There was great joy in Quebec 
when it became known that they were on their way to the Atlantic, and yet 
the joy was not without misgivings. Three vessels from old France were known 
to be in the St. Lawrence, and as these vessels bore provisions and money that 
were absolutely necessary to sustain the colony during the winter, there was 
great fear lest the ships from New England should capture them, but their 
commanders concealed them in the dark Saguenay and in due time they 
arrived in safety at Quebec. 

The people now gave themselves up to rejoicing. A procession was 
formed in honor of France, of the king, of the victory, of Frontenac, and of 
the Saints to whose intercession they ascribed the victory. A stranger not 
knowing the cause would have found it hard to understand who was being 
honored where there were so many to honor and so much to be thankful for. 
At the head of the procession was borne in derision the flag that had been 
shot from Phips' vessel. This flag was afterwards hung in the cathedral, 
where it remained until 1759, when it was burned in the conflagration of 



122 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

that determined siege which placed the Union Jack permanently on the 
heights of Quebec. This rejoicing was kept up all day long ; men, women 
and children joining in the many processions ; and when the last rays of 
the sun faded behind the hills, a huge bon-fire in honor of their white-haired 
preserver was lighted on the summit of the rock, its blaze turning the night 
into day. Frontenac's heart was overflowing with joy. He had suffered 
much in Canada, but this honor from his children was, he felt, a sufficient 
reward. 

Old France as well as New France rejoiced in Frontenac's victory over 
the New Englanders, and the King in recognition of Frontenac's good work 
wrote him a letter with his own hand, and sent him a gift of two thousand 
crowns. 

Frontenac did not rest satisfied with repelling the English. He realized 
that sooner or later they would return to Canada to wipe out, if possible, the 
disgrace of this reverse, and, as soon as the danger was removed for the 
present, he set to work to make the country secure from future invasions. 
He did extensive work on the fortifications at Quebec, Three Rivers and 
Montreal. He recognized that while England remained in possession of the 
country to the south of Canada, the French colony would have but a very 
uncertain life. He looked forward to the conquest of the English colonies, 
and, with this end in view, begged the king to send a squadron to attack 
New York. New York once conquered, he believed it would be an easy 
matter to subdue the Puritans of Boston ; but the king needed his troops 
and ships in Europe and could not spare any vessels to attack New York. 

The successes of the Iroquois under the administrations of Le Barre and 
Denonville had made them exceedingly bold, and, despite the reverence and, 
fear they had for Frontenac, they continued to make raids on the French 
settlers in the out-lying districts and on the Indian allies in the western part 
of Canada. This warfare irritated Frontenac and on several occasions he 
took vengeance on the Iroquois captives who fell into his hands. He was not 
above the barbarity of his age and ordered two of these to be burned at the 
stake, and handed others over to the Cliristian Indians to undergo torture. 
It is hard to judge him for these acts. The brutal murders committed by 



COUNT DE FRONTENAC. 123 

the Iroquois on defenseless settlers may have made it necessary. Even in 
tlie last century, soldiers of England in India, with the massacre of Cawnpore 
before them, were not less cruel to the Sepoys than was Frontenac to the 
Iroquois. He determined, however, to force them into submission, and as a 
preliminary step sent a force of six hundred and twenty-five men against the 
Mohawks. It was a successful expedition and many of the enemy were slain 
or captured. The work of Frontenac soon began to tell ; the Western 
Indians, regained their old confidence in the French, and just at a time when 
the inhabitants were despairing of ever regaining their trade in beaver-skins 
with the Indians, a fleet of several hundred canoes laden with furs arrived at 
Montreal, and even the bitterest enemies of Frontenac realized that he had 
not only saved the country with the sword, but had re-established the trade 
which was the life of the colony. 

There was for a time comparative peace in the colony, and with it the old 
quarrels between Frontenac and the Intendant, and Frontenac and the clergy 
began afresh. Frontenac recognized that the English were the chief factor in 
keeping the Iroquois inimical to the French. He was in constant dread of 
Iroquois attack and determined to make one mighty effort to force them into 
submission, or to destroy them. He begged the home government to send 
him ■ more troops, but the home government, apparently, could spare but a 
scanty three hundred. He, however, decided once more to raid the Iroquois 
country and this time on an extensive scale. As a preliminary step to the 
expedition he had projected he made up his mind to re-establish Fort 
Frontenac to serve as a base of attack. 

His enemies in New France dreaded the re-establishment of this fort. 
They believed that Frontenac's desire to have it garrisoned once more was 
not for the defence of the country, but that it might serve as a great station 
for the fur trade in which he was interested. The Intendant Champigny led 
the opposition and carried the quarrel to the home government. A letter 
was sent from France forbidding the re-establishment of Fort Frontenac, bul 
the wily governor had anticipated the order and before its arrival had seni 
seven hundred men to garrison the place. The Intendant demanded that 
they should be withdrawn, but Frontenac, despite the king's order, refuse^ 



134 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

to comply. He had set his heart upon the Iroquois expedition and he would 
permit nothing to turn him aside from it. He knew that the king would be 
angry with him for disobeying the order, but he believed that a great victory 
over the king's enemies would cause his act to be overlooked, and so collecting 
twenty-two hundred men he advanced into the Iroquois country. The 
inhabitants fled before him and when his troops reached Onondaga they 
found it deserted and burned to the ground. They destroyed the maize crop 
and the stores of grain as Denonville had done, forced the Oneidas to humbly 
submit to them, and then returned to Canada. Few of the Indians were put 
to death by the sword, but their country was laid waste and their crops 
destroyed, and Frontenac was of the opinion they would be starved into 
submission. The expedition was not as successful as he had hoped, but he 
managed to make the king believe that it was a great triumph, and his 
sovereign not only forgave him, but honored him with the Cross of the 
Military Order of St. Louis. 

Once back in Quebec the old quarrels began again. Frontenac desired 
to hold the north-western country for the French, and for this end thought 
that the trading posts should be strongly fortified and well garrisoned, but 
Champigny and the Jesuits thought otherwise ; they believed that all troops 
and traders should remain in the settled communities, and that the Indians 
should be forced to bring their furs to Montreal and Quebec. Frontenac was 
suspected of favoring the out-lying stations for selfish reasons, and the king 
was induced to order the abandonment of all such positions. But it was 
recognized in the colony that Frontenac's policy was the true one, and the 
king's order never took effect. 

Trade had increased, prosperity had come to the colony and the Iroquois 
had become more docile, and Frontenac had now time to turn his attention 
to the English, but just when affairs were at this stage the treaty of Ryswick 
was signed, and war between the French and English ceased. 

However, it had not altogether ceased in America. New York and New 
France both claimed the Iroquois as subjects. Frontenac declared that if 
they did not come to him to conclude peace he would compel them to do so. 
On learning this the Earl of Belloniont, Governor of New York, wrote to him 



COUNT DE FRONTENAa 127 

that he had sent arms to the Iroquois, ordering them to defend themselves if 
attacked by the French, and added that he would send soldiers to their aid if 
necessary. 

Frontenac was now an old man. He had but few weeks to live, but he 
replied to Bellomont with all his old-time fire and energy. " I am 
determined," he wrote, " to pursue my course without flinching, and I request 
you not to thwart me by efforts which will prove useless. All the protection 
and aid that you have given, and will continue to give, the Iroquois, against 
the terms of the treaty, will not cause me much alarm, nor make me change 
my plans, but rather engage me to pursue them still more." 

These vigorous words were written in August, 1698. In November 
Frontenac was seized with a serious illness, and on the 28th of the month, at 
the age of seventy-eight he passed peacefully away. He was deeply lamented 
in the colony; all classes alike mourned his death, even his enemies forgot his 
faults and many of them recognized that the country had sustained an 
irreparable loss. Among these was his old opponent Ghampigny, the 
Intendant, and Champigny's wife. Frontenac seems to have completely 
forgiven the Intendant, although they had been such bitter enemies. To show 
that he held no spite he bequeathed to Ghampigny a valuable crucifix and to 
Madame de Ghampigny a reliquary which he esteemed very highly. After 
his death Ghampigny wrote to the court in terms of the highest praise of 
Frontenac's character. 

But there were others who hated him even in death, who could only see 
in him a man possessed of extravagant pretensions, who believed him a 
political quack and declared that he never acted save in his own interests. 
They did not understand the dual character of Frontenac. Selfish he was, it 
is true, but at the same time no man was ever more loyal to his country. He 
loved Old France and New France, and although he used his high office for 
the purpose of making money he did it that he might have the power that wealth 
gives, and that power he had ever hoped to use for the building up of the great 
empire he conceived when he first looked upon the rocky fortress of Qiaebec. 



CHAPTER VIL 

GENERAL JAMES WOLFK. 

Wolfe's Birthplace — A Soldier from his Cradle— Joins the 12th Regiment of Foot — Wolfe's 
General Apjjearance — His Military L,ife in Flanders — Operating Against Prince Charles 
iWward in vScotlaud — At Culloden Moor — In Love with Miss Lawson — His Efforts to 
Cultivate His Mind— Attracted Towards America— Distinguishes Himself at the Siege of 
Rochefort — Joins Expedition Against I^ouisburg — A Poor Sailor — The Strength of the 
" Dunkirk of America " — Wolfe Leads the Landing Party at Louisburg — Siege of the 
Strong Fortress — Its Surrender — Wolfe Anxious to Attack Quebec at once — Sails for 
England — Fighting Disease — Appointed to Lead the Expedition Against Quebec — Sails for 
America — The Death-Struggle between the French and English in America About to 
Begin — Montcalm a Worthy Opponent of Wolfe — The English Fleet Reaches Quebec — 
Attempts to Destroy It with Fire-Ships — Wolfe's Efforts to Capture Quebec Unsuccessful — 
The French Confident of Holding Out Till Winter— Wolfe Prostrated by Disease — 
Determined to Gain the Plains above the City — Wolfe's Heart Presages Death — Scales the 
Cliff— Battle of the Plains of Abraham— The Death of Wolfe— The Daath of Moncalm— The 
British Troops March Into Quebec — Amid Her Rejoicing England Mourns for Wolfe- 
Conquest of Canada Makes Revolutionary War Possible — Wolfe's Body Taken to England. 



IN the little out of the way village of Westerham in Kent, on January 
2, 1727, a man child was born, who was to become known to the world 

as the man who finally crusiied French power on the North American 
Continent. No doubt the time was ripe for the conquest of the French by 
the English in America, but the energy, the skill, and bravery of Wolfe 
hastened the conquest. 

James Wolfe was of a military family and early turned his thoughts 
towards military afFuirs ; in fact, it might almost be said that he was a soldier' 
from his cradle. In 1740, when he was but thirteen years old, he expressed 
a strong desire to accompany his father, who was Adjutant-General to the 
expedition against Cartagena. His mother was greatly opposed to having 
her delicate young son go on such a perilous expedition, but he seemed to 
have persuade'l his father into granting his request. Fortunately, no doubt, 
sickueaa prevented him at the last moment from realizing his hope. 



GKNERAL JAMES WOLFE. 129 

Doubtless had he gone, he would in all probability have perished in that 
ill-fated expedition. 

During the Christmas season of 1741, while visiting at Squerryes, he 
received a commission appointing him to his father's regiment of marines. 
On the spot in the garden where this precious document was handed to him 
a column surmounted by an urn has been erected to his heroic memory. In 
April, 1742, he was exchanged to the Twelfth Regiment of Foot, — ^a lucky 
change, as Wolfe was about the poorest sailor imaginable and suffered from 
sea-sickness the moment a boat he was in began to rock. 

Although Wolfe was such an ardent soldier he had very little of the 
military man in his appearance. He was tall and lanky, sickly in appearance, 
■with a colorless fa«e and decidedly red hair ; his forehead and chin receded 
unpleasantly, and his nose was slightly turned up, but his splendid eyes and 
firm mouth redeemed his features and showed on a second glance that he was 
a man possessed of a strong will and keen intelligence. 

He began his active military life in Flanders in the year 1742. Here 
he found soldiering anything but pleasant and the only active engagements 
he experienced were those between the soldiers and the burghers of Ghent. 
But the army of Austria and England was to see fighting of a different kind. 
Wolfe was about to learn what soldiering, in the true sense of the word, 
meant. From Ghent his regiment marched to the Rhine, over difficult roads 
and with but a scanty supply of food. Wolfe was at this time but sixteen 
years old, and yet seems to have impressed himself so much upon the 
authorities that he was appointed acting-adjutant to his regiment. He was 
present at the celebrated battle of Dettingen and played in it a gallant part. 
His younger brother, " Ned," was in the same fight and Wolfe's only alarm 
seems to have been for his brother's welfare. He wrote an account of this 
battle and showed himself, even at that early age, an excellent military critic 
with a keen eye for the complicated movements of a great battle. In this 
fight he had several narrow escapes. On one occasion his horse was shot 
under him, and he was thrown heavily, but he came out of the battle with, 
only a few bruises. The good work he did at Dettingen was recognized, and he 
was promoted to a lieutenancy and commissioned as adjutant 



130 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

After the battle of Dettingen the Twelfth Regiment for a time saw no 
more active fighting but lay idle in the low countries. However, Wolfe 
seems to have been doing good work, and in 1744, got his captaincy and was 
transferred to the Fourth Regiment of Foot. By this change he missed being 
present at the battle of Fontenoy where his old regiment lost three hundred 
and eighteen ofl&cers and men. 

His next field of active operation was in the north of England and in 
Scotland where his regiment was sent as one of the army opposing Prince 
Charles Edward. He was present as brigade-major at the battle of Falkirk, 
and in this fight learned to appreciate the prowess of the Highland soldiers. 
So critical was the situation in the north that the Duke of Cumberland, 
probably the best soldier of his time, was sent to take charge of the forces 
operating in Scotland. At Culloden Moor Wolfe was in the thick of the 
fight ; his regiment, Barrels — as the Fourth Regiment of Foot was called — 
sufiering very heavily, more so than any other regiment engaged. It is said 
that on this field Wolfe was ordered by the Duke of Cumberland to shoot a 
wounded Highlander who had looked insolently at his highness, — but Wolfe 
replied with the words : " My commission is at Your Highness' disposal, but 
I never can consent to become an executioner." If this story is true the 
Duke of Cumberland thought none the less of young Wolfe for his 
independence and continued to the end to be his firm supporter. 

For a time Wolfe remained in the Highlands helping to so subdue the 
rebel Highlanders that there would never again be any danger of a rising 
against the government in Scotland. 

His regiment was next moved to Flanders where he fought against 
Saxe. In November, 1747, he was back in England enjoying a much 
needed rest. It was during this time that he fell in love with the 
daughter of Sir Wilfrid Lawson ; however, he was not to have much 
time for love-making. His work was still appreciated by the government 
and he was appointed major of the 20th Regiment and accompanied 
the regiment to Scotland. As the colonel of his regiment was appointed 
Governor of Nova Scotia about this time, Wolfe had full command 
aud proved himself a most efiicient commanding ofiicer. He was 



GBrarSRAL JAMES WOLFE. 131 

stationed at Sterling for a time and spent here and likewise at other places in 
Scotland what was probably the most dreary season of his life. He was 
much in love and separated from the fair one ; he was yearning for active 
service, and the sickness which was to cost him so much suffering before 
Quebec was rapidly undermining his constitution. But his mental and 
physical depression seemed only to make him more energetic, and when his 
regiment was moved to Glasgow, he bought books and engaged tutors and 
industriously emj)loyed his spare moments at the study of Latin and 
mathematics. He was commissioned a lieutenant-colonel in 1750, having 
risen by ability in an age when positions in the army were usually given to 
court favorites. He ^^emained for several years in Scotland, and dreary years 
they were. His enthusiastic military nature was all the while hungry for 
battles and ''the path of glory." 

The critical situation in America between the French and English 
colonists made him turn his thoughts to that great new land, and he 
hoped for active service there. He was, indeed, to have accompanied 
Braddock on that general's staff, but for some reason the appointment was 
changed. He was greatly shocked when he heard of Braddock's reverse in 
the wilderness ; and when he learned the details exclaimed in anger, " that 
the cowardice of the men exceeded the ignorance of the general." This has 
long been the general opinion with regard to Braddock's expedition, but a 
full knowledge of that reverse proves it no worse than many that the 
British army has suffered in the late Boer war, and indeed it was no 
worse than the attack made by Wolfe against the French intrenchments 
on the Beauport shore during the early stages of the great siege of Quebec. 
Wolfe's next chance to distinguish himself was in the expedition sent out 
for the destruction of Rochefort. He sailed from England on the " Ramillies " 
and when the fleet reached its destination he was one of the first to propose a 
plan of attack. He made a careful reconnaissance and felt confident that his 
plan would succeed, but those in command of the expedition had not the energy 
to carry it out. The expedition proved a hopeless failure and returned to 
England without accomplishing anything. Wolfe remarked bitterly with 
regard to it that " we lost the lucky moment m war aiHi were not able to 



132 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

recover it." These words are significant and are like Nelson's " lucky five 
minutes between victory and defeat," It was being able to seize the moment 
that won Louisburg for the English, that landed the English troops on the 
Plains of Abraham, and that defeated Montcalm's army before the walls of 
Quebec. One man alone seems to have gained lustre by the Rochefort 
expedition. Shortly after its ignominious return Wolfe received a colonel's 
commission and won admiring words from the great Pitt. 

On January 6, 1758, Wolfe was called to London, and was here offered 
a brigadiership in the army which was to be sent to America to recapture 
Cape Breton from the French, The young officer was Pitt's choice, and he 
received the appointment over the heads of many older and more experienced 
soldiers. After all the failure of the Rochefort expedition was to be a blessing, 
but for it Wolfe might never have been sent to America, and the history of 
Louisburg and Quebec might have been altogether different 

The army now being sent to America had for its ultimate object the 
driving of the French from the North American continent. For this purpose 
two important strongholds, the strongest in the world with the exception of 
Gibraltar, Louisburg and Quebec, would have to be captured. Quebec was, 
of course, the great centre of civil and military life in North America, but 
Louisburg would first have to be dealt with. That strong position once 
captured the entire strength of the British army could be concentrated against 
the historic rock guarding the St. Lawrence. 

For this expedition Admiral Boscawen was placed in command of the 
fleet and General Amherst in command of the army. There were to be three 
brigadiers on this expedition ; Lawrence and Whitmore were already in 
America, and Wolfe was to make the third, and although experienced only in 
European warfare was to prove the hero of this expedition. 

The Louisburg force embarked at Portsmouth in February. It consisted 
of about eleven thousand men. Wolfe was senior officer of the fleet, but 
during the stormy passage of nearly three months, his work must largely have 
been done by subordinates, as he suffered almost continuously from sea-sickness. 
All things, however, have an end, and on May 10, Wolfe with forty sail 
entered Halifax harbor. The Commander-in-Chief of the expedition had not 



9BNERAL JAMES WOLFB. 183 

yet arrived at this place, and the troops waited here for • nearly three weeks, 
but at length, on the 28th of the month, the force set sail for Louisburg, the 
Dunkirk of America, Once more the fleet was to experience storms, and it 
was not until June 2, that the British vessels arrived off the strong fortress. 

It seemed an impregnable position. Since it had been foolishly handed 
over to the French against the wishes of the American colonists, over 
£1,000,000 had been expended on the fortress. The walls surrounding it 
were over one and a half miles in circumference. It was garrisoned by three 
thousand regulars, and this force was augmented by Indians and militia. 
Besides this there were in the harbor seven line-of-battle ships and five 
frigates, and these added three thousand sturdy sailors to the fortified 
population of the place. On the walls were some two hundred and fifty 
cannon and mortars, and it was said that there were abundant provisions in 
Louisburg to withstand a year's siege. 

A storm was raging when the English arrived off the place, and, as there 
was but little abatement for five days, no landing could be attempted. It 
seemed to the British sailors and soldiers that nature was fighting for the 
French, but, on the morning of the 8th, the sea was calmer, and, although 
the waves were still foaming on the rock-bound coast, it was decided to 
attempt a landing. Wolfe was selected to lead the attack and the main body 
of troops under him were destined for Freshwater cove four miles west of the 
town. At dawn, while the guns of the fleet thundered against the French 
position, Wolfe with his flotilla of boats bearing twelve companies of 
Grenadiers, a picked corps of Light Infantry, a company of New England 
Rangers and a regiment of Eraser's Highlanders swept shoreward. They 
were met by a deadly fire, but the spirit of their commander had taken 
possession of the men, and nothing could check them. Soldiers were shot 
down under a hail of bullets, boats were overturned and a number of brave 
fellows were drowned; but the landing party pressed on and were soon formed 
up in a sheltered position on tiie beach. Wolfe was one of the first to reach 
the land. 

As soon as the men were formed up and had recovered their breath after 
the arduous work of reaching the shore, they fixed bayonets and charged on 



184 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

the enemy's position. The French, seeing themselves likely to be cut off from 
the rear, retreated in haste to the walls of Louisburg, suffering considerable 
loss. This attack on the lines of defence on the west, left the other end of the 
beach clear for the landing of Amherst's men. The whole command now 
advanced and all the French troops who had been disputing the ground fled 
in haste to the protection of Louisburg. 

For several days the army was kept busy moving the camp stores and 
getting ashore. The French had a formidable battery on Goat Island, which 
divided the entrance of the harbor. Amherst saw the necessity of silencing 
this battery as quickly as possible, and dispatched Wolfe with twelve hundred 
men to construct a battery immediately opposite. The work was done 
without oppositipn and Wolfe then erected a second battery on Light-House 
point. The enemy's ships in the harbor, and the batteries kept up a steady 
fire on this latter position but did comparatively little harm. Meanwhile the 
British guns had been doing most effective work, and by the 26th of the 
month Goat Island battery was silenced. The French Admiral, in order to 
make the harbor more secure, on a dark night sank half of his ships in the 
narrow strait leading into it. 

This preliminary work against the out-lying positions being practically 
completed, the attention of the British was now turned against the strong 
fortifications of Louisburg itself. The trenches were pushed forward until they 
came within reach of the cannon flanking the western walls. The work was 
progressing slowly but surely and Wolfe's young and impetuous nature 
desired to have it hastened to a conclusion. He believed that Louisburg 
might be captured in time for the fleet to move against Quebec before autumn, ' 
but Amherst thought otherwise and continued his work in a soldierly and 
methodical manner knowing that Louisburg would fall without serious loss to 
his forces. 

The fighting went on; the cannonading from the British batteries causing 
much destruction of property and life within Louisburg while the British in 
their splendidly constructed trenches suffered but little. The troops during 
July saw much fighting. The French on numerous occasions made sorties 
from their strongholds but were ever repulsed with loss and the British 




OLD CASEMATE AT LOUISBURG 





^ 



OLD FRENCH MAGA^UNE AT; ANNAFOLIS 
TWO HISTORIC RELICS OF EARLY FRENCH SETTLEMENT 



OKNERAL JAMES WOLPB.' 187 

batteries moved forward. On the 27th of the month the British forces 
succeeded in burning to the water's edge three of the big French ships in 
the harbor and the following day a portion of the town was in flames and 
much of the shipping was burned. Two ships remained intact and these a 
force of blue jackets seized, and though one grounded the other was 
successfully towed under the British batteries. It now seemed that Louisburg 
was not as well stocked with provisions and ammunition as was at first 
supposed. The inhabitants were facing starvation and the ammunition was 
running short. On the 24th of the month only four French guns were feebly 
replying to the thunderous roar of Wolfe's batteries. On this same day these 
guns were silenced and the engineers reported that the breaches in the walls 
were sufficiently large for venturing on an assault, but before it could take 
place the citizens who saw the uselessness of continuing the struggle forced 
the governor of the place, Drucour, to surrender unconditionally. On the 
27th, the English army marched in triumph into the place that the French 
in America and in Europe had thought impregnable. 

Wolfe was anxious to proceed against Quebec at once, and earnestly 
besought Amherst to do so ; but winter was coming on apace, and the sailors 
dreaded the difficult navigation of the St. Lawrence, and so the taking of 
Quebec was postponed. If the army was not to proceed at once against the 
capital of Canada, Wolfe, who was suffering greatly from ill-health, was 
anxious to return to England ; but instead of realising his wish, he, with 
Sir Charles Hardy and seven ships, was sent to the lower St. Lawrence for 
the purpose of laying waste the country. He detested the work, and called 
it "a sorry but a necessary business." 

In October Wolfe sailed from Louisburg for England, and after a speedy 
voyage landed at Portsmouth on November 1. He was recognized as " the 
hero of Louisburg " and as a reward for his splendid services was appointed 
to a colonelcy of the 67th Regiment, and joined his new command at 
Salisbury. 

Wolfe was now suffering greatly, as his disease had laid firm hold upon 
him, and he must have realized that he had not long to live ; but he wished 
to die in harness, aad was looting forward to fiirther service. Pitt recognised 



|,j^ BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

that he was his ablest general, and when the government determined to send 
an expedition against Quebec in the following spring, he appointed Wolfe 
Commander-in-Chief 

It will be remembered that Wolfe had fallen in love with a Miss 
Lawson ; but his suit had been rejected and for some years he avoided the 
society of women and was sunk in the deepest melancholy on this account ; 
but during the winter before setting out on the Quebec expedition he became 
attached to a Miss Lowther, and, although it has been said there was not 
much love in the case, an engagement took place. 

To brace him for his great expedition he took a course of the waters at 
Bath, but returned to London with unimproved health. A strange general 
this I But the physical frame mattered little ; there was more will in that 
disease-racked body than in the robust frames of all the other British 
generals put together. It was this will that won Canada for England. 

Despite his ill-health he organized the expedition with the greatest care, 
seeing to every detail himself. Before he assumed command he stipulated 
that he should choose his own stafif, and Pitt, who recognized the strength of 
his young general, granted his request. Considerable indignation was 
expressed in some quarters that Wolfe should have been raised over the 
heads of so many older and more experienced officers, and to meet the 
prejudices of the army, he was to continue to hold the rank of colonel ; the 
rank of major-general being conferred upon him temporarily, to be held only 
in America. Monckton, Murray and Townshend took service under him as 
brigadiers with brevet rank. 

The character of Wolfe is well shown by his selection of officers. On 
several occasions he was opposed by the War Office in his selections, and, in 
the case of Guy Carleton, whom he wished for quartermaster-general, the 
king himself refused to sanction the appointment, but Wolfe would brook no 
opposition, not even the king's, and in the end he prevailed. It might be 
that the expedition would prove a failure, but if it did he wjbs prepared to 
bear the entire blame. That the king was capable of appreciating Pitt's 
general is shown by a remark that he made at the time. So great a miUtary 



GENERAL JAMES WOLFS. 1S9 

enthusiast was Wolfe that some believed his mind unhinged. Newcastle is 
said to have told the king that he was mad. 

" Mad is he I " replied the king, " then all I can say is I hopo he'll bite 
some of my generals." 

On February 17, Admiral Saunders, who was in command of Wolfe's 
fleet, sailed from Spithead with some of the troops. Wolfe himself was on 
board the " Neptune," ninety guns. As usual he suffered intensely from 
sea-sickness on the voyage to Halifax. It was a slow passage owing to the 
storms and heavy winds, and it was not until May that the coast of Nova 
Scotia was sighted. Louisburg harbor was still frozen, and it was necessary 
for the fleet to go to Halifax where ships and troops were gathering. It was 
the beginning of June before the final arrangements were completed and then 
Admiral Saunders and Wolfe sailed from Louisburg to attack the fortress 
which nature had made the strongest on the North American continent. 

Before the end of June the French in Quebec knew that they would 
soon be in the midst of the severest struggle that ever took place in Canada, 
but they had every confidence in their military leader. Montcalm's successes 
had given them faith in his genius. On the other hand the English troops 
felt equally confident in the ability of Wolfe to take Quebec The work he 
had done before Louisburg in the previous year convinced them that no 
obstacle was so great as to be able to resist his indomitable will. 

France at this time did not possess a cooler head and a braver heart 
than Montcalm's. England, likewise, had not a truer soldier than young 
Wolfe. The encounter was indeed to be a meeting of heroes, and a long and 
severe struggle was expected. The English were hopeful, but the Freiich 
laughed at the idea of their being able to capture the rugged rock from 
which their soldiers had so easily repulsed Phips' attack fifty years before. 
In the spring of 1759, the news reached Quebec that a British fleet was 
en route for the St. Lawrence. At first the inhabitants were terror-stricken, 
as Quebec was in no condition to stand a long siege, but their fears were 
dispersed by the arrival of eighteen sail with supplies from France. British 
cruisers were on the watch for this fleet, but they had successfully passed 
them unseen. 



X40 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

Montcalm was at this time at Montreal, but hastened to Quebec with the 
utmost speed in order to prepare it for a successful resistance. All the 
available troops were hurried into the city, and the excited inhabitants 
anxiously kept watch for the expected warships. The fleet, however, suffered 
long delays and did not appear for some weeks, and thus gave the French 
time to make ample preparations to receive them. Montcalm and Vaudreuil 
resolved to concentrate their entire force on the river front between the St. 
Charles and the Montmorency Rivers, a distance of eight miles, and one 
continuous line of redoubts, batteries, and entrenchments was constructed. 
Two hulks were mounted with cannon and placed at the mouth of the 
St. Charles ; and a boom of logs was thrown across it to keep the English 
fleet from passing up. Every available entrance to the city was closed and 
barricaded save one which was left open to admit the troops from the river 
front. A hundred and six cannon frowned from the heights, and a 
considerable floating battery with guns, fire-ships and fire-rafts protected the 
front of the city. The entire number of men under arms in and about 
Quebec was over sixteen thousand. After everything was ready the French 
patiently awaited the foe, but no foe appeared. At last the suspense was 
broken by the news that the fleet was at He aux Coudres. Three 
midshipmen belonging to it were captured and brought to Quebec, greatly 
alarming the French by their tales of the tremendous size and strength of 
the approaching squadron. 

On June 21, a portion of Wolfe's fleet arrived in the north channel of 
Orleans Island, and very soon all the vessels passed the difficult navigation of 
the St. Lawrence and anchored south of the island. Some of the leading 
vessels had hoisted the French flag which attracted several of the 
inhabitants to come on board. In this way they were able to secure the 
services of men who were fairly familiar with the river, but in a number of 
cases the ships had to grope their way up the difficult channel, and that they 
passed it without the loss of a single ship was a source of considerable surprise 
to the French authorities. That same night a small party landed and had a 
brush with the inhabitants, who, when beaten crossed over to the north 
shore. The next day was a busy one for the British soldiers ; boats loaded 



GENERAL JAMES WOLFE. 141 

with troops plied busily between the ships and the island until the entire 
army was landed and drawn up on the beach. Wolfe was anxious to begin 
action at once, and, without delay, began to look about him for a point of 
vantage from which he might attack the city. He was appalled at the 
strength and vastness of the preparations made to resist his army. He had 
little more than half the number of the French troops, who were behind 
strong protection, but his men were nearly all tried soldiers ; and, though 
the difficulties were great, he felt that with such an army he would not know 
failure. 

On the day when the British troops were landed on the Island of Orleans a 
furious gale arose and lasted for some hours. The French, as usual in such 
cases, believed that Providence was interposing on their behalf and hoped 
that the storm would destroy the entire fleet. But it was only a summer gale, 
and subsided as quickly as it had arisen. While it lasted it drove the ships 
hither and thither, and in spite of the utmost vigilance some were driven 
ashore and others collided, causing no small damage. When the storm went 
down, the French determined to try the effect of fire-ships on the invaders. 
These ships were the largest of the merchant vessels that had brought out 
their supplies and had been equipped for their work of destruction at an 
enormous cost, when the means at the disposal of Quebec is considered. To 
make their deadly work almost certain, they had been filled with pitch, tar 
and other inflammable material, besides having on board firearms and cannon 
crammed to the muzzle, together with ever conceivable explosive. 

Vaudreuil appointed Deluche, a distinguished naval officer, to the 
hazardous task of guiding the fire-ships to the fleet of the foe, and setting fire 
to them at the appropriate moment. Fortunately for the English, Deluche's 
courage failed him, and he ignited the vessels much too soon. The night 
was pitch dark, but the sudden blaze in an instant dispersed the darkness. 
The British, fearing an attempt on their encampment, drew up their forces in 
readiness to resist, and watched the approaching fire-ships. One after another 
leaped into flames, and soon the whole river, from the Montmorency to the 
city was as light as day. The flames were not long in reaching the explosives 
and the air was filled with the crash of loud reports and the whizzing of balls 



142 lU'U.PKUJ^ OK CANADA. 

and Inillett. Ilowover, Deluche had been so hasty In his work that no harm 
wtvs done to the British vessels. Some of tlie jfii-e-ships ran ashore before 
reaching the fleet, and others were towed ont of harm's way by the energetic 
British seamen who rowed out and grappled them. Some of the seamen were 
experienced in this kind of work and took it as a joke, shouting to each other 
as they approached the spluttering infernos : " Damme Jack, didst ever have 
Hell in tow before ?'* One of the vessels blazed so rapidly that its captain 
and A number ef the crew were burned before they could escape in their 
boats. 

Vandreuil had expected much from this enterprise, and hopefully 
climbed into the church steeple at Beauport about three miles from Quebec, 
to see the British fleet annihilated. When he saw how useless the whole 
undertaking had been, his discouragement was extreme, 

Wolfe determined to begin more active hostilities at once. He carefully 
considered every avtiilable point of attack, and concluded that his best move 
would be to take up a position on Point Levis, directly opposite Q.uebec. He 
despatched General Monckton thitlier with his brigade on June 29, and on the 
following day went over himself and selected the most commanding point 
from which his cannon might play upon tlie city. As soon as his intention 
-vwis discovered the guns of Quebec poured out a leaden storm upon his 
workmen. Many were killed, but the work of entrenchment was vigorously 
continued and in a sliort time his troops had secured a strong and 
comparatively safe position. Contrary to Montcalm's judgment an attempt 
was made to drive them from their enti-enchments, but the work was entrusted 
to irregulars who advanced with so little judgment that one division of the 
att^*^cking party fired into another and in the end retreated to their boats with 
the loss of seventy killed and wounded. When all was ready the besiegers 
turned their guns upon the city ; many of the inhabitants fled to the country 
in terror. In all dinections bursting shells set fire to the houses, and among 
other buildings the rev«r«d cathedral was given t« the flames. This fire, 
however, although doing a great deal of damage to the houses of the city, 
IPM of very little pradioal value to the British. It brought them no neiu-er 
to the capture of Quobec, excepting that it j>erhaj>s discouraged the Canadians, 



a£NIfiRAL JAMES WOLFS. 143 

and made tTiem feel that in Wolfe there was, at least, a more formidable foe 
than Phips before their walls. 

Wolfe became impatient at seeing nothing accomplished but a useless 
destruction of property. He determined to make an effort to attack the main 
body along the St. Lawrence. It was impossible to charge them successfully 
from the river, and so he took up his position to the left of their forces on the 
banks of the brown and rapid Montmorency. He hoped by this move to 
press back the left of the army, or if not by ascending the Montmorency to 
find a ford by which his army might cross and get to the rear of the enemy. 
As soon as he felt himself strongly posted, he began to harass the foe, who 
vigorously returned his fire and many lives were lost on botli sides. His 
battery at L6vis still kept up its disastrous cannonade on Quebec. The 
Lower Town was almost totally destroyed and but few of its inhabitants were 
courageous enough to remain in the shelter of their houses. The effect of 
this determined siege was already beginning to tell. Many of the Canadians 
deserted to the British ranks, reporting that only dread of their officers kept 
their countrymen from coming over in a body to the British lines. 

Near the end of July the British ship " Sutherland" and several smaller 
vessels, succeeded in passing the fortress of Quebec and taking up their station 
above the city where they captured a number of French vessels. This was 
unfortunate for the French, for they had now not only to defend Quebec and 
the St. Lawrence, but also to use a large part of their troops to defend the 
country above the city. The British followed up this success by dragging 
boats across Point Levis, and, launching them at a point out of range of the 
enemy's guns, filled them with men to join troops who were already up the 
river. These at once began operations so that the French were now attacked 
from three points — Montmorency, L6vis, and the rocky plateau above Quebec. 
Montcalm, though vigilant, smiled at the efibrts of the British. He was 
convinced that " Monsieur Wolfe could never capture Quebec." He knew his 
own strength and thought that all would be well if he could keep his men 
from becoming discouraged. However, he wisely determined to remain on 
the defensive. Vaudreuil was much more despondent and observed with 
great alarm the successes of the enemy's fleet His fire-shipa had been a 



i44 BUILDEES OF CANADA. 

failure, but he-determined to make one more mighty effort to destroy their 
vessels. He had some seventy rafts, boats and schooners joined together and 
loaded, like the fire-sliips, with guns of all sorts, crammed to the muzzle with 
grenades, bombs and other explosive weapons. This " gigantic infernal 
machine" v/as carefully directed and appeared destined to destroy at least a 
portion of the fleet. But British courage was too much for French ingenuity 
and the hardy sailors gallantly manned their boats, and grappling the blazing 
raft, towed it ashore, with bursting cannon and showers of bullets falling about 
them. Shout upon shout went up from their lusty throats, as one piece of the 
raft after another struck ground and blazed itself out. The French turned 
away in disgust. It was no use to try to intimidate such men. The only 
thing they could do was to keep them outside of the city, and this, at least, 
seemed easy enough. 

Summer was rapidly drawing to a close, and Wolfe, seeing that if 
something were not soon done the year's work would be lost, decided to make 
a strong attack on Montcalm's river force. He directed a division of his 
army against the enemy's entrenchments, and on the last day of July a fierce 
battle was fought. The battery at Levis poured its leaden hail into the city, 
the ships along the shore cast shot and shell into the French camp. While 
the cannon on the left of the Montmorency drowned the roar of the Falls 
with their thunder. The French were not idle, their guns replied with equal 
strength. An attempt was made to land in front and charge the foe but it 
was quickly repulsed. On this occasion a thousand grenadiers and loyal 
Americans, veterans of Louisburg, seemed to have lost their heads and 
without commands from their officers charged wildly at an impossible position, 
which was strongly guarded by three thousand picked riflemen. They lost 
heavily and but for an opportune thunder-storm very few of them would have 
escaped. As it was, this mad attack up the slippery hillside caused the loss 
of four hundred and forty-three men, among whom were thirty-three officers. 
Wolfe saw how impracticable it was to attack from the Beauport side, and, 
withdrawing his troops, thought out another plan. The French were 
delighted with the punishment they had given the foe, and Vaudreuil 
exultingly wrote to a friend, " Monsieur Wolfe, I can assure you, will make no 



GENERAL JAMBS WOLPB. 14*? 

progress/' He reckoned without his host, Wolfe did not know what failure 
meant. 

The British general, from the commencement of the siege, had longed 
to meet the French in open field ; but this repulse made the chance 
of a general engagement seem more remote than ever. Montcalm knew that 
his raw militia were much more serviceable behind entrenchments than they 
could be in a fair hand-to-hand engagement, and so would run no risks. 
Wolfe, on his first arrival in the country, had anxiously looked to the heights 
above Quebec, and now he once more turned his eyes to the broad plains 
above the city. His first task was to look for a practicable ascent. 

In the meantime he gave orders to have the country round about laid 
waste, and his men did their work only too well. Many villages and farm- 
houses were laid in ruins, and not a few of their resisting inhabitants put to 
the sword. The British soldiers had caught so much of the revengeful spirit 
of their foes, that in many cases they scalped their fallen enemies. No strong 
resistance was made to these depredations, the French feeling that every man 
was needed to protect the city itself. Wolfe began to despair. He even 
thought of giving up the siege for that year, and going into winter quarters 
at Isle aux Coudres, intercepting as far as possible the supplies of the French, 
and forcing them to surrender in the following spring. But, before doing 
this, he determined to make at least another attempt to capture the city and 
with it Montcalm's army. 

As rapidly as he could he brought a number of his ships past the guns 
of Quebec. No delay was permitted. Attack after attack was made on the 
heights, and so effective were some of them that De Bougainville was sent 
with about two thousand soldiers to keep the British troops from making a 
successful landing. One attack was so vigorous that Montcalm felt it 
necessary to take command in person, but the wary British had retreated 
before he could reach the scene of action. All was not running smoothly 
with Wolfe's men, however. Disease broke out in their camps, and many of 
the best soldies were unfit for service. But the French suffered far more in 
every way. Disease was rife, food was scarce, and supplies were now almost 



148 BUIT.DERS OF CANADA. 

entirely cut off from the upper country. Their city was in ruins, and even 
should the English fail to capture it that year, a fearful winter stared them 
in the face. 

On August 20 great sorrow spread through the British army. "Wolfe, 
who had exhausted himself by ceaseless toil and thought, and who through 
the long siege weeks was to be seen everywhere strengthening the weak and 
encouraging the strong by his hopeful spirit, was seized with an illness so seve^re 
that he was confined to his bed, and lay restlessly tossing with fever in a 
farmhouse at Montmorency. About the end of the month, however, to the great 
joy of his men he recovered, so far, at least, as to be able to devise another plan 
of attack. He proposed three plans to his brigadiers, Monckton, Townshend 
and Murray. One of these was to cross the Montmorency about eight miles 
from the St. Lawrence, and, with a large force, to march rapidly through the 
forest and fall on the rear of the French, while a contingent stormed them 
from the river. The second was to ford the Montmorency at its mouth, and 
to march along the shore until a point could be found where a British army 
could charge the French out of their entrenchments. The third was to make 
a concentrated attack from the front 

But the brigadiers wisely advised him to abandon all three ; and, after 
long consultation, suggested that the next attempt should be to scale the 
heights above Quebec. Wolfe had from the first looked to this quarter for 
victory, and gladly acted on their suggestioa. 

On the last day of August, the General was able to leave the house for 
the first time since his illness, and his presence greatly raised the spirits of 
the army. He had not much hope of success, but he was determined that 
they should not have it to say in England that he had not done his best. 
His first task was to concentrate his forces along the upper bank of the river. 
He sent up to join Admiral Holmes all the ships he could spare from his 
fleet below Quebec. Seeing that bis men at Montmorency were of no 
practical use, he at once decided on evacuating his position there. Montcalm, 
observing the move, sent a forc« to harass the retreating British troops. 
Monckton, who had been viewing the operations from Point Levis, 



GENERAL JAMES WOLPB. 149 

despatched a considerable force to attack Montcalm in front, compelling him 
to recall his men ; and the English were thus enabled to retire without loss. 
The French scarcely knew what to make of the move, and began to hope 
that their foes were about to raise the siege and depart. Their hopes were 
greatly strengthened by seeing the troops hurried on board the fleet above 
Quebec. They did not, however, relax their vigilant watch by night and 
day. 

This work had been too much for the heroic Wolfe, and on September 4 
he was again prostrated with illness and suffered intensely. This unfortunate 
event affected every man in the army. Wolfe, however, had a will capable 
of crushing down pain, and overcoming bodily weakness; and on the 
following day was once more among his men, haggard and worn, but as 
energetic as ever. Every cove, bay and rock was eagerly scanned with the 
telescope, and he at length fixed upon a place where he thought it possible 
that his army might scramble up. It was evidently a weak spot in the cliff, 
for the white tent of the guard could be seen gleaming there in the 
September sunshine. This was the Anse du Foulon, perhaps the weakest 
point anywhere about Quebec. Even here it was by no means an easy task 
to scale the cliff ; and, as Montcalm had told Vaudreuil, a hundred vigilant 
men could have kept a whole army at bay. They expected that Wolfe would not 
leave the St. Lawrence without trying this point. A strong guard was therefore 
posted for its protection, under command of Captain de Vergor of the colony 
troops. This individual had on a former occasion ingloriously surrendered 
Fort Beau Sejour in Acadia to the English. Besides the guard, the battalion 
of Guienne was within hailing distance, and the batteries on the headland of 
Samos, and on the heights of Sillery, were in a position to play upon any 
approaching boats. 

De Bougainville was stationed at Cap Kouge, nine miles above Quebec, 
with a force of about three thousand men, and it was decided to begin final 
operations by attacking and harassing his position. 

On September 7 Admiral Holmes sailed up to Cap Rouge, and began 
firing on Bougainville's force ; at the same time sending off troops to feign a 



150 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

landing. This was but a ruse of Wolfe's to keep the enemy from suspecting his 
intention of attempting to scale the cliff at the Anse du Foulon. Holmes kept 
up his attack for several days, allowing his fleet to drift up and down with 
the tide. De Bougainville was constantly on the watch, and wore out his 
troops by marching them up and down the shore to prevent the British from 
landing. While these operations were under way a storm arose and seriously 
interfered with the designs of the besiegers. The troops in the boats were so 
drenched with, rain that they were compelled to land on the south shore, to 
dry their clothes and rest. 

This unsatisfactory mode of fighting was soon to end. On the twelfth of 
the month, Wolfe issued his last general orders. He felt that at length the 
time had come to strike, and the sooner a battle was fought the better. 
Deserters from the French army brought him most encouraging tidings. The 
food in the city was almost exhausted, and there was but little chance, at 
present, of the besieged obtaining more. The French generals, too, were 
greatly disheartened by the necessity of dividing their forces to protect, not 
only the city, but the shores above and below. Wolfe was confident of 
success, and his hopeful spirit inspired both officers and men. They were 
ready to follow him anywhere, and knew that if they could but once meet the 
enemy in battle the siege would be as good as finished. He had but 8,400 
men that he could land, and the enemy even in their reduced condition, 
numbered double as many. 

The first task was to choose an advance party to undertake the hazardous 
feat of scaling the cliff and surprising the guard so as to clear the way for the 
troops. Among such men as he had under him it was not difficult to find 
twenty-four volunteers ready to face even death ; and Wolfe had soon 
mustered a party of men as brave as ever led a forlorn hope. Seventeen 
hundred men were to go ashore with the scaling party, to be ready to follow 
them to the heights in case of success. De Bougainville anxiously watched 
the fleet as the numerous boats left it laden with men. He thought he was 
to be attacked and remained on the defensive. As the tide was flowing in 
just then, Wolfe allowed the boats to float up stream, completely deceiving 



GENERAL JAMES WOLFE, 151 

him, as he supposed an attack was to be made upon his position like those 
from which he had already suffered, but on a more extensive scale. 

On the same day French deserters brought in the welcome news that 
during the night supplies were to pass down to Montcalm's camp under cover 
of darkness. Wolfe at once thought that his boats might seize the opportunity 
of going down in advance of them, deceive the sentinels along the river, and gain 
the Anse du Foulon ■ without opposition. He had some fear that Montcalm 
might suspect his intentions, and that the French might be in force on the 
Plains of Abraham to oppose his landing. To avoid this Admiral Saunders, 
who was in command of the fleet in the basin of Quebec was to storm 
Montcalm's position while Wolfe, in person, made the attack above the city. 
At nightfall, Saunders began a fierce fire on the entrenchments and sent off 
boats loaded with men to pretend a landing. Montcalm was completely 
deceived, and as the battle grew hot and vigorous, he called his troops 
together to resist what he supposed to be a concentrated attack. 

While Saunders was doing such effective work on Montcalm's' 
entrenchments, Wolfe was patiently awaiting the ebb of the tide which was 
to aid his men. At two o'clock in the morning everything was in readiness. 
A signal lantern gleamed from the mainmast of the " Sutherland." It was 
the signal to begin operations and the boats at once began to float toward their 
destination, favored by a light wind. Wolfe was in one of the foremost boats, 
and while he was being rowed ashore recited Gray's celebrated poem, " Elegy 
Written in a Country Churchyard " — saying, as he finished, " Gentlemen, 
I would rather have written those lines than take Quebec." The recitation 
of such a poem at such a time, shows clearly that Wolfe's heart was presaging 
death. It may be he wished it, he knew he had not long to live and it 
would be glorious to die in harness on the great battle-field of the morrow. 
This was not the only evidence that he anticipated death ; to several of his 
more intimate friends he had said that he did not expect to survive the battle ; 
and to his old school fellow, " Jackie" Jervis, afterwards the distinguished 
admiral Lord Vincent, who was then in command of a sloop before Quebec, 
he said that he did not expect to survive the battle, and he took from his neck 
a miniature of Miss Lowther, his fiancee, and asked Jervis to deliver the 



152 BUILDEES OF CANADA. 

portrait to Miss Lowther if he should fall in the fight After the battle, too, 
the following verses from Pope's ** Iliad" were found in his pocket; 

"But since, alas ! ignoble age must come, 
Disease, and death's inexorable doom, 
That Life which other's pay, let us bestow. 
And give to fame what we to nature owe. 
Brave let us fall, or honoured if we live, 
Or let us glory gain or glory give. 
Such, men shall own, deserve a sovereign state, 
Envied by those who dare not imitate." 

As the British troops neared the shore a French sentinel seeing the boats 
cried out, " Qui Vive/" "La France!" was the reply of a Highland officer. 
"A quel regiment f questioned the sentinel. " De la Reine," answered the 
quick-witted officer. The troops then passed on unmolested, the sentinel 
believing them to be part of a French regiment on the way from De 
Bougainville's camp to join Montcalm. Tbey were again challenged at the 
headland of Samos, but this, too, they passed in safety, by replying to the 
sentinel, " Provision boats ! don't make a noise ; the English will hear us I" 

In a few minutes after passing Samos they landed at the Anse du Foulon, 
and quickly disembarked. The volunteers at once began scaling the wooded 
heights, scrambling up among the rough bushes that then, as now, clustered 
thickly on the steep bank. De Vergor was not on his guard, but had gone to 
bed. He relied too much on the difficulties of the ascent. So completely 
was he taken by surprise that the foe were upon him before he could dress. 
He endeavored to escape, but was shot in the heel and captured. The guard 
was soon overpowered, and the troops below came scrambling up after their 
victorious comrades. Before the last of the boats had landed, the battery at 
Samos became aware of the real character of the force, and began to fire 
upon it. A party was detailed to silence this battery, and they did it quickly 
and effectually. Scarcely had these guns ceased when the sullen roar from 
Sillery told the British that the gunners there knew of their presence and 
were on the alert. This battery, too, was soon captured, and the river front 
immediately above Quebec was left entirely unprotected. Quickly the fleet of 
boats sped between the ship and the shore, until all the needed troops were 



QSNBSAL JAMES WOLF£^ lOd 

landed. At daybreak the heights were held by a large force that had 
succeeded in dragging several cannon up the difficult bank. 

Wolfe at once looked about him for a battle-ground, and soon decided on 
drawing up his troops on the rough plateau known as the "Plains of 
Abraham." He now had what he had anxiously longed for — a prospect of 
an immediate meeting in a general engagement with the foe ; yet victory 
was not certain, and a defeat would have been a horrible disaster in his 
present position. He had not exactly burnt his ships behind him, but retreat 
to them was an impossibility. The force in Quebec, too, although composed 
of inferior soldiers to his picked troops, vastly outnumbered his men. 
However, he hopefully awaited the coming of the enemy. As has already 
been pointed out he did not expect to survive this battle, but he felt sure that 
his brave soldiers would win the day. He would not shirk any danger, but 
with Murray . and Monckton took command of the centre, where he 
anticipated that the heaviest fighting would occur. 

Meantime in the early September morning, Montcalm, in his tent, was 
roused by the startling news of this unforseen landing eflfected by his gallant 
antagonist. He hurried at once to the city, followed by a motley crowd of 
soldiers and citizens. At break-neck speed he galloped on to the scene 
of action, and to his amazement found the rough plateau of the "Plains " 
occupied by a strong force of the enemy. For the first time since the 
oommencement of the siege he seems to have lost his head and acted rashly. 
His troops were comparatively safe within the walls and it would have been 
aext to impossible for Wolfe to have taken Quebec by assault. He was 
playing the enemy's game when he decided to begin an engagement at once. 
He hoped that Vaudreuil would join him with a strong force, but in this he 
was disappointed. Hia ardent spirit would brook no delay. His men, too, 
were eager for action, and with them he went at once to meet the foe. His 
thrilling voice, that had so often inspired his soldiers, urged on his excited 
troops to the charge for the honor of France, and on his spirited black steed 
he galloped from point to point brandishing his sword and urging his men to 
their arduous and perilous task. 



164 EUII.DEKS OV CANADA. . 

The English troops waited steadily the charge of the foe, holding their 
ground with admirable firmness, notwithstanding the harassing fire of 
skirmishing parties. Wolfe went from company to company, cheering his 
men by word and deed. At ten in the morning he saw that the moment had 
come for the decisive blow. 

The French assembled on a ridge in front of him, and collected their 
strength for the final charge. In a few moments the whole force was in 
motion, Montcalm on his black charger, leading the way. Volley after volley 
poured from the ranks as the French advanced on the steady phalanx of the 
British. In the opposing ranks not a soldier moved from his post, save when 
one fell and a comrade stepped forward to take the vacant place. When the 
enemy was within forty paces, the command " fire ! " rang out and was 
passed rapidly along the line. As one man the whole body poured a leaden 
hail into the advancing ranks, a second almost instantly followed and c lel 
indentations in the line and heaps of fallen men told the eftect of the fire. 
The French troops paused and wavered in their advance. A third well aimed 
volley at pistol distance changed the advance into a retreat. The British 
troops were then ordered to "charge!" and with a true British cheer they 
drove the scattered enemy in full flight toward Quebec 

Montcalm received a shot through the body, in the retreat, but succeeded 
in getting into the city. Wolfe who had taken up his station at tlie head of 
his grenadiers was three times wounded. He first received a slight flesh 
wound in the wrist at the beginning of the fight, and then in the height of the 
struggle a ball in the groin, but he brp.vely led on his men. Another charge 
bdo-ed in his breast and he fell to rise no more. Lieutenant Browne of the 
grenadiers saw him stagger and rushed forward to give him a helping arm 
" suppor; me," said Wolfe, " lest my gallant fellows see me fall," but he fell 
before Browne could reach him. He was carried to the rear by a volunteer 
named Henderson, Colonel Williamson, Lieutenant Browne and a private 
soldier. He was past the need of an earthly physician and refused to have 
one attend him. The torpor of death quickly seized his physical being, but 
he was roused by the words, " they run." "Who runs?" he called, his eye 
brightening for a moment. The glad news reached his dying ears, " the 




WOLFE'S MONUMENT IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY 



GENERAL JAMES WOLFE. 167 

French." A happy smile passed over his face. But even at that moment, 
and while he was suffering intense agony from his wound, his duty was not 
forgotten, every detail of the fight and the surrounding country was vividly 
before this skilled strategist. He was dying in harness, and a soldier's 
command was almost the last to leave his lips. " Go, one of you, to Colonel 
Burton, and tell him to march down to the Charles river, to cut off their 
retreat from the bridge J" Then as he felt that his work was done, and done 
well, he turned on his side, with the words, " Now, God be praised, I die in 
peace 1 " And the true hero breathed his last — his death forever consecrating 
to the hearts of Canadians the little spot of rough green sward which is still 
marked by a stone column, bearing the brief inscription: " Here Wolfe died 
victorious, September 13, 1759." — A victor over the French and over death. 

His brave antagonist, Montcalm, did not survive his defeat ; he died in a 
house in Quebec which is still associated with his heroic memory. 

By nightfall on the seventeenth, one and twenty British guns, were ready 
to open their deep voices on the city of Quebec. The gunners behind the 
strong walls seemed to have lost heart and only a feeble reply was made to 
the cannonading that opened upon them. Governor Ramezay at length sent 
out a flag of truce to the British for the purpose of considering terms of 
surrender. He made efforts to get favorable conditions but Townshend 
promply informed his messenger that if the city were not delivered into his 
hands by eleven o'clock on the following day he would capture it at the 
bayonet point. The city was surrendered by the time stipulated upon and on 
the afternoon of the eighteenth the grenadiers marched into Quebec. 

In the meantime there was great anxiety in England. Wolfe after his 
repeated failures had sent a despatch which cast gloom over the public and 
the administration, Pitt himself began to despair, and to think that perhaps 
he had made a mistake in appointing so young a commander to so important 
and difficult a task. While England was still brooding over Wolfe's despatch 
another arrived very different in tone. It contained the news of his triumph 
and of his death; never was the nation more delirious with joy. Bon-firea 
were lit in all parts of the kingdom, bells were rung and cannon boomed forth 
the thankfulness of the people. France, England's ancient enemy, had 



168 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

suffered defeat, and by the courage and perseverance of the youngest of 
England's leaders had been driven from the North American Continent. But 
in the rejoicing there was deep mourning ; a great leader of men had been 
discovered only to be lost, and, at a time when the army sadly needed leaders, 
his death was bitterly deplored. 

New England, too, rejoiced. Her soldier? had fought nobly to drive the 
French from Canada. Of the significance of the battle of the Plains of 
Abraham to them, but few of them could then realize. It was this battle that 
made the Revolutionary war possible. In this campaign and in the campaign 
against Louisburg many of their best officers and soldiers received their 
training. As has been said, "the battle of the Plains of Abraham was the 
true starting point for the independence of the United States." 

On the eighteenth of October the British fleet was ready to sail for 
England, and on that day the ships started on their long journey across the 
Atlantic. The " Royal William," with flag at half-mast, led the fleet seaward 
bearing the body of the conqueror of Quebec. On November 16, the vessel 
arrived at Spithead. The nation honored its heroic dead, and, though Wolfe's 
body was buried in the family vault in the parish church at Greenwich, a 
monumeiit was erected to his memory in Westminster Abbey. 



CHAPTER VIIL 

GUY CAELETON. 

Tuy Carieton a Favorite with Wolfe— Born in Cornwall— At the Siege of Quebec— Promoted 
to the rank of Brigadier-General— Governor-General of Canada— Visits England in the 
Interests of the Colony— His Policy with Regard to the Province of Quebec— Quebec Act 
Passed— This Act Not Satisfying to All Parties— General Carleton Returns to Canada- 
Canada Threatened with Invasion— Montgomery Invades the West— Arnold Marches 
Against Quebec — The "Continental" Army Before Quebec — Arnold's Demand for 
Surrender Treated with Derision— Montgomery Victorious in the West— Governor Carleton 
Escapes from Montreal with Difficulty— The Journey to Quebec— Montgomery Joins 
Arnold— Canadian Winter Hard on the "Continental" Army— Disloyalty Among the 
French — An Attack Planned — The Death of Montgomery— Arnold's Forces Driven Back 
With Loss— Congress Determines to Send a I^arger Force into Canada— Commissioners 
Sent to Win Canadians to American Cause— Governor Carleton Remains on the Defensive- 
Reinforcements Reach Quebec in Spring— The British Drive the Americans from Before the 
City— The Invading Army Retires From Canada— Carieton Gets Control of Lake Champlain 
for the British— General Burgoyne Appointed to the Supreme Military Command- 
Governor Carieton Resigns His Office— Knighted by the King— Appointed to Succeed 
Clinton as Commander-in-Chief— The Friend of the Loyalists Who Settled in Canada- 
Created Baron Dorchester— Lord Dorchester Sent to Canada as Governor— Rules with 
Firmness and Wisdom— Dissatisfaction With the Quebec Act— The Constitutional Act 
Passed— A Critical Time in Canadian Affairs— Lord Dorchester Leaves Canada— The True 
Founder of British North America, 

^ENERAL WOLFE by his dogged determination, resolute will and 
extensive military experience won Canada from the French in 1759. 
He hud with him at the great siege of Quebec a young officer who was 
afterwards to save Canada for England, and to do much to unite into a compact 
nation the naturally antagonistic races settled along the St. Lawrence. Guy 
Carleton had been selected by Wolfe as his quartermaster-general in the 
expedition against Quebec contrary to the wishes of the king and his ministers. 
Wolfe made no mistake in the choice; he had in his army no more 
trustworthy officer than the young man of thirty-four, who was to be the first 
truly great maker of Canada under the British regime, and who afterwards, 
as Lord Dorchester, was to lay the foundation of the Canada of to-day. 

159 



160 r.T^TT.HEKS OF CAXADA. 

Guy Carleton, like many another brilliant soldier, 'was an Irishman, 
liaving been born at Strabnne in September, 1724. He early began a military 
career and \vas trained in the wars that did so mnch to make Wolfe; 
but it was not until the siege of Quebec that his abilities as a soldier and an 
administrator began to be recognized. When the fortress surrendered he 
proved himself one of the most efficient officers in the new-won colony and at 
the second battle of Q.uebec, when De L6vis made a mighty effort to win back 
the city from the British troops and almost succeeded, he was promoted to the 
rank of brigadier-general for his brilliant services. 

The Governor-General of Canada after the conquest of Canada was 
General Murray, but in 1766 he returned to England leaving Lieutenant- 
Colonel JEmilius Irving to conduct the Government. Five months after his 
departure Guy Carleton reached Quebec as Lieutenant-Governor and acting 
Governor-General; a year later he became Governor-General. Several of his 
councillors had been guilty of what he considered political misdemeanors 
and he promptly struck their names off the roll. He likewise dismissed 
several officers who were considered guilty of extortion. His action at the 
beginning of his rule was generally appreciated and gave the inhabitants of 
Canada, especially the French, confidence in him. He had long seen that 
there was much dissatisfaction in the Provinces, and he saw that it would 
continue and increase unless a radical change was made in the mode of 
governing Quebec He had no easy community to rule ; at that time 
there were in the country about 150,000 French and about 400 or 500 
English, and the difficulties were increased by tlie fact that the British were, 
for the most part, Protestants, and the French, Roman Catholics. But he had 
a definite policy and in 1769 visited England leaving Hector Theophile 
Cramahe to conduct the government in his absence. He crossed the Atlantic 
with the hope of having the home government legislate according to what he 
saw to be the needs of the colony. 

His policy as stated by Mr. William Houston was : " (1) To enlarge the 
area of the Province of Quebec so as to include within it as much as possible 
of the territory which had once belonged to French Canada ; (2) to centralize 
botli legislation and administration as nuieh as possible under the control of 



GUY OARLETON, 161 

the Crown ; (3) to secure the active influence of the Roman Catholic Church 
on the side of Great Britain in the impending struggles between her and the 
rebellious colonies ; (4) to allay as much as possible the hostility of the con- 
quered race by conceding to them the system of law to which they had been 
accustomed before the conquest ; and (5) to make financial provision for the 
cost of government without resorting to the imposition of unpopular 
taxation." 

It was no easy matter for General Carleton to bring about his wishes with 
regard to the "bill for reconstituting the government of the Province of 
Quebec," but after four years of arduous effort he had the satisfaction of 
seeing the Quebec Act passed — an act which did quite as much as the guns of 
the citadel to repel American invaders. 

By this celebrated Act the boundaries of Canada were extended westward 
as far as the Mississippi and southward to the Ohio ; the Catholics were assured 
of the free exercise of their religion, and by it " the clergy of the Catholic 
Church may hold, receive and enjoy their accustomed dues and rights with 
respect to such persons as shall profess the said religion " ; it restored the 
Custom of Paris in civil matters, but in criminal matters the law of England 
was to hold ; supreme authority was vested in the Governor-General and an 
Executive Council of not more than twenty-three members, nor fewer than 
seventeen, this was to consist for the most part of persons of British birth. 

This act caused a good deal of dissatisfaction, especially among the 
British colonists. A number of the leading statesmen of England protested 
against it, and Chatham declared that it destroyed the " liberty that ought to 
be the foundation of every constitution," and prophesied that it would soon 
lose His Majesty the hearts of all his American subjects." Carleton, however, 
knew the situation much better than the British parliamentarians and 
recognized that, while it would be unwelcome to the handful of English- 
speaking people in Quebec, it would be received enthusiastically by the 
French population, and in time of war would keep them loyal to the British 
Crown. 

When General Carleton returned to Canada he found the country 

threatened with invasion. The American colonies had drawn the sword 
10 



162 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

against the motherland and had determined to drive the British from thig 
continent. Washington, the commander of the forces, knew that while the 
British held Montreal and Quebec, they really held the key to this continent, 
and he despatched Montgomery against Montreal arid the west, and 
Colonel Benedict Arnold against Quebec by the difiScult route of the 
Kennebec and the Chaudi^re. In case Arnold was unsuccessful in his 
attempt, Montgomery was to join him and the two together were to make a 
united effort to drive the English from the stronghold Wolfe's courage and 
perseverance had won. 

Arnold's march was one of the most remarkable in the history of war 
He embarked on the Kennebec towards the latter part of September, and 
struggled for days against that rapid stream, then portaged his canoes across 
the high land to the Chaudi^re, and swept down that turbulent river toward 
the St. Lawrence. After thirty days of severe toil, the troops found 
themselves reduced to the necessity of killing some dogs they had with them 
for food, and some even endeavored to devour the very moccasins they wore. 
On the fourth of November they reached a French settlement, where they 
procured food, and some of the famished soldiers ate so greedily that they 
died from the effect of their gluttony, and left their bones to bleach on the 
line of march. On the eighth. Point L§vis was reached, and after five days 
delay they succeeded in crossing the St. Lawrence, and landed unobserved at 
the very spot where Wolfe had landed sixteen years before. 

Arnold expected that the habitants would eagerly rush to his banner, but 
in this he was disappointed. The French had no love for the British flag, but 
they found their lot under it much easier than it had been under France and 
her governors. Again, they had less love for the New Englanders ; the hated 
Bostonnaia had ever been their enemies, and so, of the two English-speaking 
masters they preferred the out-and-out Englishmen. But Arnold and his men 
had come far and had suffered much, and were eager to have their reward, 
so, although they had received little encouragement from the inhabitants of 
Canada, they drew up before the walls of Quebec and demanded an 
unconditional surrender. 



OUY CABLBTON. 163 

When the citizens of Quebec saw the formidable force of the 
" Continental" army they trembled for the safety of their city, but their 
engineer, Mr. James Thompson, was far from being hopeless. He had 
received orders from General Carleton, who was in the west hopelessly 
eudeavoring to stem the tide of invasion, to put Quebec into a state of defence. 
Palace, Hope and St. Louis gates, and the whole brow of Cape Diamond were 
fortified without loss of time. In the Lower Town all windows facing the 
river were closed, loopholes alone being left for musketry. The defences 
were done hastily, but Thompson had no doubt that they would keep out 
the foe till General Carleton arrived to take charge of the city, and cement 
the English and French within the citadel into one grand resisting force. 

Thompson's hopefulness diffused itself among the citizens, and when 
Arnold requested them to open their gates, they treated his demands with 
derision, climbing on the walls and hurling at him the opprobrious name 
" Horse Jockey," in reference to his having traded with them as a horse- 
dealer on former occasions. Thompson treated his demands in a more serious 
way, levelling at his troops a twenty-four pounder, that had the effect of 
showing them that they had watchful enemies within Quebec. Arnold's 
force had been reduced by desertion by one-third of its number, and he felt 
that, with his present strength, it would be impossible to storm the city, so he 
retreated to Pointe-aux-Trembles to await the arrival of General Montgomery 
and his army. 

In the meantime the British had been suffering in the west. Fort St. 
John's, Fort Chambly, and Montreal had surrendered in rapid succession, 
and it was with difficulty that Guy Carleton escaped from Montreal. 

When Montreal fell. Governor Carleton felt that the only hope of saving 
Canada from the invading forces was to hasten to Quebec at once. Captain 
Bouchette, a hardy Canadian, undertook to pass him through the 
American lines. On a pitch dark night in November, the Governor of 
Canada accompanied by several trusty officers began his flight in a skiff 
propelled by muffled paddles. Not a word was spoken ; and the commands 
were given by signs. Time and again they were almost discovered as they 
crept down the river past the watch-fires of the enemy. So near did they 



164 BUILDERS OF CANADA, 

approacli to the sentinels at times that they were compelled to stop paddling 
altogether, and allow their skiff to drift as lifeless as a log down the stream. 
Once when in danger of drifting on the shore, they kept their skiff in 
mid-stream by propelling it for nine miles with their hands. They halted at 
Three Rivers and went to an inn to rest, and the tired Governor, resting his 
head on his arms, fell into a much-needed slumber. But he was soon 
rudely awakened by the loud talking of American soldiers in an adjoining 
room. He despaired of escaping, but Captain Bouchette with great cleverness 
succeeded in passing him and his party through their midst, and without loss 
of time their skiff was once more on its way to Quebec. They soon met and 
boarded the armed brig "Fell," and before long a favorable breeze had 
swept them to their goal. Their was great rejoicing in the city at their 
arrival, and the shouting and firing of joy-guns reached Arnold on his retreat 
to Pointe-aux-Trembles. Without delay Carleton examined the fortifications, 
and soon had everything in a fit state to stand a protracted siege. 

On the first of December General Montgomery reached Arnold's camp, 
and the men, impatient from their inactivity, met him with exulting shouts. 
They clamored to be led against Quebec at once. Montgomery acquiesced in 
their wish, and on the fifth day of the month they were marched along the 
frozen roads to the city. When it was reached the American commander at 
once sent in a flag of truce, but Carleton would have no communication with 
rebels, and the siege commenced in earnest. 

The Canadian winter had set in, and although Montgomery was not 
prepared for a lengthy siege, he placed several guns on the far side of the 
St. Charles, four on Point Levis, and a strong battery of six pieces before 
St. John's Gate, and began to bombard the city. In the meantime his men 
took possession of the country round about, and soon from every important 
point could be seen the crimson or red and black flag of the " Continental " 
army. 

The inhabitants, particularly the French, began to think that Carleton 
would yet have to surrender, and not a few living outside the city walls became 
sympathetic with the rebels. The suburb of St. Roch was particularly disloyal ; 
every house sheltered one or more of the enemy, who kept up a constant 




STATUE TO GOVERNOR SIMCOE 



OUT OARLBTON. 167 

series of petty attacks on the city. The famous palace erected by the 
• Intendant BigoC in this suburb offered an excellent opportunity to the foe, 
and they crowded its cupola with riflemen who succeeded in picking off 
several of the British sentries ; but Carleton turned a nine-pounder on this 
position, and soon the lordly palace, so famous in the history of New France 
was laid in ruins. 

All through the month of December the siege lasted with but little injury 
being done to either side. The Americans were becoming disheartened and many 
believed that their long and trying march had been in vain. Their one hope 
lay in attempting to take the city by assault, and their general decided on 
adopting this course. Towards the end of the month the order was given for 
every man to hold himself in readiness for a night attack. A gathering 
storm was to be the signal for the assembling, and eagerly the officers and 
men watched, the heavens for the propitious sign. Several times they were 
called out, but the moon swept up from behind the clouds just as the advance 
was about to be sounded, and all were sent to their quarters. 

At last, on the night of December the thirteenth, leaden clouds swept 
down from the north, and all felt that the decisive time had arrived. The skies 
grew darker and darker and at two o'clock on the following morning 
Montgomery called out his men, and gave the officers their orders. 

Colonel Livingstone, in command of a regiment of mercenary Canadians, 
and Major Brown, with a part of a Boston regiment, were detached to make 
a false attack on St. John's Gate, and if possible to set it on fire. Colonel 
Arnold at the head of a strong force was to march round by the way of the 
suburb of St. Roch ; while General Montgomery took upon himself the almost 
foolhardy task of leading a band round the base of the cliff", in the face of the 
fact that a strong guard was posted in this position. If he and Arnold were 
successful they were to unite their forces at the foot of Mountain Hill, and 
the forcing of Prescott Gate, and the taking of the Upper Town would be a 
comparatively easy task. 

Shortly before daylight they moved to the attack. Colonel Livingstone's 
command, for some unexplained reason, was altogether unsuccessful, and 
retreated without even attempting to carry out their orders. Some ascribe it 



168 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

to the depth of the snow, that made their advance impossible, while others 
say that the Canadian mercenaries failed the Americans at the critical 
moment. 

Montgomery and his men crept slowly along the St. Lawrence from 
Wolfe's Cove, till they reached the base of the cliff on which stands the 
modern citadel. Here, under the frowning heights that loomed up 
threateningly through the piercing storm, they found the narrow passage 
known as Pres-de-ville, protected by pickets and they were compelled to halt 
and reconnoitre. 

General Carleton had expected an attack from this side, and had not 
only protected the pass by pickets but had erected in it a blockhouse in 
which was a battery of three guns. Here a force of about fifty men was 
stationed under Captain Barnsfare, a master of a transport. On this fateful 
morning the men were on the alert, and the presence of the Americans soon 
became known. 

Montgomery went forward with his carpenters to cut away the palisades, 
and helped pull them down with his own hands. This work completed, he 
and several of his officers, with great foolhardiness, advanced along the pass 
towards the blockhouse. As they saw no light they took it for granted that 
the soldiers there were not watchful. But this was what Carleton had hoped 
for. Captain Barnsfare gave the command to fire, and Sergeant Hugh 
McQuarters, who was in charge of the guns, sent a shower of grape-shot hurt- 
ling along the pass. At the same time the small-arms of the guards rang out 
with telling effect. Through the storm several men were seen to plunge forward 
and fall, never to rise again. They were General Montgomery, his two 
aides-de-camp, and a number of brave soldiers. His bewildered troops did 
not even attempt to carry off the body of their commander, but beat a hasty 
retreat, leaving him to be covered by the thickly falling snow. They could 
not have done otherwise ; for ten minutes the small-arms of the soldiers rang 
out, and in the narrow defile no one could have shown himself without 
meeting instant death. So ended the attack from the Pres-de-Ville side of 
the city, and it might be added that the siege itself was practically at an end, 



GUY CARLETON. 169 

for the hope of the Americans lay dead in the narrow pass with three 
death-wounds, one in the chin, one in the groin, and one in the thigh. 

The sound of the conflict had reached the Upper Town, and every bell 
in the city was ringing furiously to call the people to arms. The walls were 
soon lined with anxious faces, and the troops of Arnold, now slowly 
advancing along Sault-au-Matelot Street through a blinding storm of 
sleet, had a vigilant foe awaiting them. Several barricades had been erected 
to guard this entrance to the city, and on these they boldly advanced. 
Arnold was wounded, and had to retire, but as he was carried to the rear he 
urged his brave followers on with cheering words. Nothing daunted, they 
bent forward in the face of the stinging blast, and plunged through gathering 
snow-drifts till the first barrier was reached. Here, a short, sharp fight took 
place, but with heroic dash they entered the embrasures and overpowered the 
guard. They advanced to the second barrier, but this was more powerfully 
and skilfully constructed, and was guarded by a stronger and more 
determined force, and after a desperate struggle they were compelled to 
meditate a retreat. But before they could put their thoughts into action, 
Captain Laws at the head of two hundred men marched out of Palace Gate 
and captured a large body of them. Some of the more daring, seeing that 
retreat was cut off, boldly dashed across the uncertain ice in the bay of 
St. Charles, and found safety on the opposite shore. Once more the rocky 
citadel had withstood a siege, and with the defeat of the attacking army and 
the capture of so many of their men, all fear of American success was 
removed. However, Arnold did not leave the vicinity of Quebec, but with 
about eight hundred men kept up the siege until spring. 

In the meantime, when General Schuyler, who had been promoted to 
the command of the army invading Canada, learned of Montgomery's death 
and Arnold's defeat, he advised Congress to send at least 3000 men 
into Canada. It was impossible to detach so large a force from the 
comparatively small army under Washington, and the American eommander- 
hwshief gave orders for the raising of at least one thousand anti-Britisk 



170 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

Obngress oace more appealed to the Id habitants of Canada to assist in 
casting off the tyrant's yoke. Fearing that they would make but little headway 
with arms they sent a commission into Canada for the purpose of rousing the 
Canadians. One of this celebrated commission waa Benjamin Franklin, but, 
as the French Canadians were aware of the active part he had taken fifteen 
years before in influencing England to make a determined attack on their 
country, he was looked upon with distrust and his diplomacy made but little 
headway. While Franklin was endeavoring to rouse the lay-men. Father 
Carrol, an ex-Jesuit, made efforts to gain the sympathy of the clergy ; but 
he, too, totally failed. The Quebec Act had given them the liberty of 
worship they desired and they felt that they could trust England. On the 
other hand they had no faith in the American leaders. They remembered 
tlmt on October 21, 1774, Congress had addressed the British people and had 
"demanded the proscription of the religion, laws, and other cherished 
institutions of the Canadians — in fact had called for their total abasement." 
The Catholics of Canada were, therefore, prepared to resist invasion. 

Governor Carleton, had he wished, might have sallied forth from the 
Gates of Quebec and driven Arnold's force from before the walls, but he 
remembered what had happened to Montcalm when he ventured forth and how 
narrowly the English had escaped defeat in the second battle of Quebec ; and 
so, with plenty of provisions for the winter, he determined to keep his troops 
behind the safe shelter of the strong walls of the city, until reinforcements 
could arrive in the spring. On April 1, General Wooster took the chief 
command of the army before Quebec, and erecting new batteries, continued 
the siege, but at the beginning of May, General John Thomas took over the 
command. He found that the American force numbered nearly 2000 men, 
but as small-pox was prevalent among the troops the effectives did not 
amount to probably over 1500. The hardships of the winter and disease 
had done much to exhaust the American troops, and General Thomas began 
to think seriously of retreating from before the city. He however, 
determined to make one last effort to storm the walls. 

The ice had now left the river and considerable shipping was huddled in 
the shadow of the mighty rock. He prepared a fire-ship, and with the ebb of 



OX7Y OJlKLETON. 171 

the tide sent it down the river in the hope of causing a conflagration among 
the English vessels, and further hoped that during the confusion which would 
arise his men might storm the walls. 

The fire-ship was a failure and burned itself out before reaching the 

vessels. While it was still burning, however, from the heights of Quebec, 

British vessels were seen sailing up the St. Lawrence. They came laden with 

supplies and reinforcements. On their arrival Governor Carleton with 1000 

men and six field pieces sallied forth from Quebec, but the Americans were 

already in flight towards Montreal, and in their haste they left behind the 

whole of their artillery, stores and baggage, and over two hundred of their sick 

and wounded. Their flight up the St. Lawrence was without order, and when 

they reached Sorel, the majority of them were found to have cast aside even 

their arms. General Thomas died at this place of small-pox and General 

John Sullivan took over the command. For a time Carleton kept up the 

pursuit in person and then returned to Quebec. The Americans saw that 

they were hopelessly beaten and Arnold, the bravest of their soldiers, at that 

time wrote to General Sullivan in the following words : " The junction of the 

Canadas with the colonies is now at an end. Let us quit them and secure our 

own country before it is too late." Two days after these words were written 

Montreal was once more in the possession of the Canadians. 

The Americans driven from Canada, Carleton endeavored to carry the 
war into their own country and for that purpose had a number of vessels 
launched on Lake Champlain. Captain Pringle had command of the fleet. 
He at first made httle headway against the American vessels on the Lake 
which were in charge of Arnold, who in the end suffered so great a loss that 
he was compelled to retreat. By the foresight of Carleton the English thus 
gained control of Lake Champlain. 

In th« following year General Burgoyne was appointed to the supreme 
military command and arrived in Quebec in May. Governor Carleton felt 
hurt by this appointment and wrote to Lord Germaine, defending his military 
conduct and shortly after resigned his office and left Canada. The British 
authorities never made a greater mistake than when they took away the 
military command from Carleton. The disgrace of Saratoga was but a 



J 72 BUILDEES OF CANADA. 

punishment for their ignorance. In the following year General Haldimand 
was appointed Governor. He was a very different man from Carleton — 
severe, tyrannical, despotic. He soon gained the hatred of the Canadians^ 
who could not but contrast his harsh rule with the mild measures adopted by 
his predecessor. 

Carleton's services were recognized by the king and on his return to 
England he was knighted. The war in America continued to drag wearily on 
but General Carleton was to take no active interest in it until its close. In 
the year 1782 he w^as appointed to succeed Clinton as Commander-in-chief 
of the Northern British Army in America. At length the end came and New 
York was evacuated by the British troops. At this tragic moment in his 
country's history he was able to do valiant service for Canada. It was due to 
Sir Guy Carleton that so many of the Loyalists sought refuge in Canada, and 
he did all in his power to have them properly provided for in their new home. 
At the close of the war he was created Baron Dorchester for his services with 
the army in America. 

Governor Haldimand remained in Canada until 1785 when he was 
recalled; and in the following year, much to the delight of the Canadians, 
Lord Dorchester was sent to Canada as Governor. He at once entered 
sympathetically into the strained situation which had been created by the 
despotic rule of Haldimand and did much to restore confidence among the 
French in the British. In 1787 he appointed a committee to enquire into 
the unsatisfactory state of education in the Province of Quebec, and in this 
wav did not a little to disseminate learning in that province. Due to the 
influx of U. E. Loyalists Upper Canada required his attention, and in 1788 
he divided the province into four judicial districts, Lunenburg, from the 
Ottawa River to Gananoque ; Mecklenburg, from Gananoque to Trent ; 
Nassau, from Trent to Long Point ; and Hesse, from Long Point to Lake 
St. Clair; in each of these districts he appointed a judge and a sheriff to 
administer justice. 

But dissatisfaction continued. The British colonists were thoroughly 
discontented with the Quebec Act and were urgent in their demands for the 
Habeas Corpus, Trial by Jury, and an elective legislative assembly. As a 



GUY CARLETON. 173 

result of this discontent the Constitutional Act was passed by the British 
parliament. Lord Dorchester had not a little to do with the framing of this 
act and with having it successfully pass the Lords and Commons, He had 
gone to England in 1791, leaving Major-General Clarke to adminster the 
government, but in 1793 he returned to Canada. 

It was now a critical time in Canadian affairs. The French Revolution 
was stirring Europe to its depths, and the revolutionary spirit found a place 
in many hearts in Canada. He had ever been a friend to the French; kind, 
generous and sympathetic, and his presence was like oil on the troubled 
waters. However, the British inhabitants of Canada were dissatisfied with his 
attitude, believing him too kindly disposed to the conquered race. 

For three years longer Lord Dorchester remained in Canada devoted ta 
the interests of the provinces and doing all in his power to unite into one 
people the French and English living under the British flag in America, and 
to make the French loyal to that flag. That the Province of Quebec has been, 
on the whole, loyal to England during the past hundred years is largely due 
to Lord Dorchester's mild and considerate rule. When he left Canada it 
must have been with considerable regret. For nearly forty years his life had 
been intimately connected with the Province of Quebec, and he had resided in 
the country for over twenty. He saw the possibilities of the new province 
he had done so much to permanently base. But for him it would have been 
lost to England in 1776; and his attitude to the inhabitants did much to shape 
the course of such men as Lord Durham and Lord Elgin. Until his death in 
1808 he continued to watch the growth of British North America with the 
belief that a great and United people, a worthy rival of the young Repubhcto 
the south, would yet be established along the dt Lawrence and by the great 
lakei. 



CHAPTER IX. 

JOHN GRAVES SIMCOE. 

Simcoe's Father Killed at the Great Siege of Quebec — His Son's Early Edncatfoa — ^Begins His 
Military Career when Nineteen Years Old — Sails for America — Reaches Boston on Day of 
Battle of Bunker Hill — At the Battle of Brandywine — Appointed Major of the Queen's 
Rangers — An Efficient Officer — Promoted to the Rank of Lieutenant- Colonel — The 
Character of the Man Shown in His Orders to the Rangers — A Narrow Escape from Death 
— ^A Prisoner — The Death of Major Andr6 — Appreciated by the Loyalists in America — 
Through Ill-Health Forced to Return to England — Elected to Parliament — Takes Part in 
the Discussion on the Constitutional Act — Appointed Governor of Upper Canada — Reaches 
Quebec on the Ship "Triton " — Proceeds to Seat of Government for Upper Canada, Newark 
— Sworn in as Lieutenant-Governor at Kingston — Selects His Executive Council — Summons 
His Parliament to Meet at Newark — In His Opening Address Governor Simcoe Eulogizes 
the Country- — Important Measures Introduced by the Legislature — Governor Simcoe Takes 
a Paternal Interest in the Province — Holds Joseph Brant in High Esteem — ^Journeys through 
the Western Peninsula — Investigates the Site of Toronto for Future Capital of Province — The 
Second Session of the Legislature — Governor Simcoe Fears American Invasion — First 
Meeting of the Executive Council at York — The Building of Yonge Street — Builds Castle 
Frank — " One Whose Door is Always Open " — Difficulties Between the Americans and the 
Indians— Simcoe's Diplomatic Attitude — Raised to the Rank of Major-General — His Efforts 
to Create a Royal Navy on the Lakes — Appointed Governor of St. Domingo — A Difficult 
Task — Returns to England — Command of Blymouth Entrusted to Simcoe — The Death of 
Lieutenant-General Simcoe. 

THE life of John Graves Simcoe, the first Governor of Upper Canada, 
was intimately associated with the American continent from his 
earliest days. He was but seven years old when General Wolfe won 
Quebec from the French. In that great siege his father, John Graves Simcoe, 
commander of the "Pembroke," was killed. Shortly before the siege 
Commander Simcoe had been captured by the French and taken prisoner to 
Quebec. While on his way to the city and when a prisoner, he had been 
careful to note the fortifications and the peculiarities of the river, and when 
Wolfe's fleet faced the difficulties of the navigation of the river approaching 
Quebec, he was able to make a chart that was of the greatest service to his 
leader in bringing his fleet to its destination. 
174 



JOHN GBAYES BDfOOB. 177 

Alttongli the son of Commander Simcoe had at an early age made up hi« 
mind to follow a military career he was, like most other boys of his class at that 
time, to receive a very excellent general education. He first attended the Free 
Grammar School at Exeter, and from there went to the celebrated school at 
Eton and afterwards to Merton College, Oxlord. He was a diligent student 
and devoted much time to history and the classics. The deeds of the heroes 
of the past were his delight ; so fond did he become of the classics that they 
were his constant companions on the battlefields of America, and during his 
arduous duties in the forests of Ontario. 

At nineteen he was to begin his military career. He then obtained an 
ensign's commission in the Thirty-Fifth Regiment. About this time war was 
threatening in America. The leaders in the colonies were most out-spoken 
against what was then called English tyranny. It was soon seen that war 
could not be averted, and when at length the blow fell troops were hurriedly 
embarked for the thirteen colonies. Among the first to be sent was the 
Thirty-Fifth Regiment. Simcoe, however, did not sail with it, but followed in 
a separate ship shortly after. He reached Boston on the memorable 17th day 
of June, 1775. 

On that day the battle of Bunker Hill was fought, and the British troops 
learned that the rude Provincials, untrained in war, save that which they had 
experienced in protecting their homes on the borders from the Indians and 
French, were able to fight bravely and skilfully. Those in authority on that 
day for the first time fully realized the tremendous task they would have to 
put down the rebellion. 

Simcoe did not long remain attached to the Thirty-Fifth. An opportunity 
presenting itself he purchased the command of a company of the Fortieth 
Regiment on September 11, 1777, and led his company with distinction in the 
battle of Brandy wine when General Howe defeated General Washington. On 
this day the Queen's Rangers, a Provincial corps, acquitted itself with great 
bravery and sufiered severely in officers and men. General Howe praised it 
for its courage and appointed Captain Simcoe, who had won great distinction 
in this battle, to the Rangers with the Provincial rank of major. 



178 BUILDERS OP CANADA. 

The Queen's rangers was a unique regiment — a forerunner of the Rough 
Riders of the United States and the Mounted Infantry of South Africa. It 
was a regiment of scouts which had been recruited for the most part in 
Connecticut. It was a mixed body of foot soldiers and mounted men. It had 
more freedom than other corps and was somewhat independent in its actions, 
its commander being permitted to act on his own initiative and not being 
compelled to wait for orders from the Commander-in-Chief. The strength of 
this celebrated regiment was between 500 and 600. It was a flying column 
and its operations extended over a wide district so that the Queen's Rangers 
and their commander became more widely known than probably any other 
regiment in America. 

Major Simcoe was through his new command brought much in contact 
with the people of America, and he did all in his power to conciliate them. 
His desire ever was to keep the loyal, loyal ; and to win to the motherland 
those who were luke-warm, or even enemies. The Queen's Rangers, while 
under the command of General Simcoe, never acted brutally towards their foes 
or failed to respect property. The greater part of the year 1778 was spent in 
foraging expeditions, and so much were Major Simcoe's services appreciated 
that Sir Henry Clinton appointed him to the rank of lieutenant-colonel. 

The character of the man and the manner in which he conducted his 
regiment is well shown in orders issued to the Rangers in 1778. In these 
orders he said " he doubted not but that all ranks of the regiment were 
sensible that the undaunted spirit which had rendered them the terror of 
their enemies was not more honorable to them than that abhorrence of plunder 
which distinguishes the truly brave man from the cowardly ruffian and which, 
had left a favorable impression on such of the inhabitants of Pennsylvania as 
had been in their power." As Mr. D. B. Read, in his Life and Times of 
General Simcoe, writes concerning those words " they seem to say in trumpet 
tones that Lieutenant-Colonel Simcoe was every inch a soldier and had all the 
characteristics of the British officer of the old school — ^honor, integrity, 
courage and capacity." 

Through the years 1778. and 1779, Lieutenant-Colonel Simcoe led the 
Rangers on many important expeditions and rarely failed to score successes. 



JOHN GRAVES SIMOOB. 179 

In October, 1779, lie had a narre w escape from death through a fall from his 
horse. He was taken prisoner at this time, and so bitter were the rebels 
against the Rangers and their leader that many of them clamored for his 
death, but on the last day of the year he was exchanged and returned to 
Staten Island where his regiment was stationed. 

The Rangers were now operating in a new field. The British troops 
were besieging Charlestown, South Carolina, and in April Simcoe's regiment 
was added to the besieging force and remained before the place until it 
capitulated in May, 1780. In this same year Simcoe was to suffer a loss 
which he felt more keenly than probably any other loss of his life — the death 
of his friend and comrade in arms, the brilliant and cultured Major Andr6, 
In a sketch such as the present it is not possible to defend or condemn 
Washington and the other American officers for their action with regard to 
Andr^. The question is open to much controversy and space will not permit 
of its discussion. Simcoe certainly condemned them and looked upon the 
slaying of Andr6 as a brutal murder. His bitter words written immediately 
after the death of his friend show how keenly he felt the matter. " The useless 
murder of Major Andre," he wrote, " would almost, were it possible, annihilate 
that wish which consentaneous to the ideas of our Sovereign and the 
Government of Great Britain has ever operated on the officers of the British 
army — the wish of reconciliation, of speedy reunion with their revolting 
fellow subjects in America." Despite his feelings with regard to the death of 
Andr6 he continued to act with his customary generosity towards his foes till 
the close of 1781. 

The aid given by the French, the sympathy bestowed on the rebels by 
their supporters in England, and the successes in the field were telling, and 
the rebellion, instead of growing weaker, waxed stronger with each day. At 
length came Yorktown and, with its capitulation, practically the close of 
the war. 

Simcoe was in Yorktown when it surrendered, but he was no longer fit 
for active service. He was in wretched health, having been thoroughly worn 
out by the steady service he had experienced since coming to America. From 
the day of the ^mttlQ of Bunker Hill till the surrender of Yorktown he had 



180 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

been continuously in the field save for the few months when he was a prisoner, 
and the exposure, the arduous marches, and the trying battles had at length 
broken down his robust constitution. A sea voyage was the only thing that 
could save his life, and so he was sent to England on parole. His services 
were appreciated by the government, and the king conferred on him the rank 
of lieutenant-colonel in the regular army. 

Shortly after reaching England he received the following most gratifying 
testimonial from Loyalists in America, which gives an idea of the work done 
by him while in command of the Rangers and shows why he was through life 
such an ardent enthusiast for the United Empire Loyalists ; — 

" I have the honor, on behalf of the deputies of the Associated Loyalists 
in Pennsylvania, Maryland, and the lower counties of Delaware, by their 
particular direction, and being fully auth(jrized by them for that purpose, now 
to express to you the high sense they entertain of your military and political 
conduct during the late rebellion in America. They are at a loss whether 
most to admire your activity and gallantry in the field or your generous and 
affectionate attachment to His Majesty's loyal subjects in America, and your 
unwearied exertions as well to promote their true interest as to preserve and 
protect their property. 

" As they have with pleasure and satisfaction had frequent opportunities 
of seeing your army crowned with success, so they have often experienced the 
marks of your favor, attention and protection ; these acts have endeared you 
to them and claim their warmest gratitude. Your particular countenance to 
and zeal for the Associated Loyalists, and your ready concurrence in the 
measures proposed for their relief, and kind solicitations on their behalf, have 
made an impression on their minds words cannot express and time only can 
erase ; and they have exceedingly to regret that the opportunity was not 
afforded them of evincing to the world, under your command, the sincerity 
of these professions and their attachment to their Sovereign. 

"They would deem themselves culpable if they did not take this 
opportunity to mention that your abhorrence of the pillage that too generally 
took place in this country, and the success that attended your vigilant 



JOHN GRAVES SIMCOE. 181 

exertions to prevent it, have marked your character and ensured to you the 
esteem of all orders and ranks of good men. 

" Your sudden and unexpected departure from America prevented their 
paying this tribute of respect to you personally, which they entreat you now 
to accept, and that you will be assured under all changes and circumstances 
your name will be dear to them, and that their wishes and prayers will 
always be for your prosperity and happiness." 

The rest in the climate of old England rapidly restored Colonel Simcoe 
to health, and by the time he was released from parole in the beginning of 
1783 he was completely recovered. 

There is little to note in the life of this distinguished soldier after his 
return from America, until he was sent out as Governor of Upper Canada. 
One important event, however, occurred in his life. It was during this time 
of peace and comparative inaction that he married Miss Guillem, a near 
relative of Admiral Graves and a distant relative of his own. 

He was, however, not idle in the years between the American Revolution 
and his own appointment to the important position of Governor of Upper Canada. 
He took an active interest in the political life of his country and assiduously 
studied the great questions pf the day. A mere follower he could not be, and 
in 1790 he was elected to represent the borough of St. Maw's, Cornwall. 
He thus entered Parliament at a time when the race difficulties in British 
North America were agitating the rulers, and when the question of dividing 
Canada into two Provinces for the better government of the country was being 
discussed. At the close of the war of the Revolution many of Simcoe's 
Loyalist friends had flocked to the British possessions north of the United 
States, and he very naturally took a particular interest in the country to 
which they had gone. On March 7, 1791, Mr. Pitt introduced his celebrated 
bill designed to meet these difficulties, and after a warm discussion in which 
Lieutenant-Colonel Simcoe took an active part the Constitutional Act 
became Law. 

It would seem that Colonel Simcoe was appointed Governor immediately 

on the passage of the bill, for on May 20, he wrote to a friend in a vein that 

would indicate that he had received the appointment. In his letter he 
11 



182 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

showed a deep interest in the country. Two classes were uppermost in his 
mind — the Indians, and the Loyalists. He seems to have taken no interest in 
the French in America, never probably having got over his antipathy to 
them on account of the death of his father at Quebec. He certainly showed 
great animosity toward the French during the Revolutionary war, and several 
times expressed himself as anxious to have his Rangers opposed to them. 

In September Governor Simcoe sailed for Canada on the " Triton," 
Captain Murray, and after a voyage in which much heavy weather was 
experienced, reached Quebec, November 11, 1791. A brief stay was made at 
the -historical old rock of Quebec, and then the Governor and his escort 
proceeded to Montreal where the winter was spent. He had with him a part 
of the Queen's Rangers, and during the winter another division of the regiment 
marched over-land on snow-shoes, from New Brunswick, and joined him at 
Montreal. Although the years that had passed since he led the regiment 
against the Continental troops had greatly changed its personnel, a number 
of the officers had fought with him during the war, and it was naturally an 
added pleasure to him in his new life to have his old corps by his side. 

He seems to have been in no great rush to reach the seat of government 
for Upper Canada, Newark or Niagara. He stayed at Montreal until June. 
No doubt he had much to do to prepare for his long sojourn on the great 
lakes remote from centres of civilized life ; besides, as he would have to make 
the trip westward in canoes, it was wise to wait until the summer was well 
advanced before venturing on the difficult waters of the St. Lawrence. 
Accompanied by his fleet of canoes the Governor and his party leisurely 
ascended the mighty and most varied of rivers, delighted with the leaping 
rapids that checked their progress, the broad lakes and the fair islands past 
which they paddled as though floating through fairyland. They made 
several long stops en route, and it was not until the beginning of July that 
Kingston was reached. 

In this city, second to Quebec and Montreal in historical importance for 
Canada, Simcoe was sworn in as Lieutenant-Governor of Upper Canada, and 
at once proceeded to organize his government. He selected as his Executive 
Council : William Osgoode, William Robertson, James Baby, Alexander 



JOHN GRAVES SIMCOE. 188 

Grant, and Peter Russell. The Council was formed on the day on which he 
was sworn in, but the Legislative Councillors, Robert Hamilton, Richard 
Cartwright and John Munro, were not selected until July 17, when the 
Executive Council met at Kingston. Four days after this meeting the 
Governor left Kingston for Newark. 

It is difficult to tell just why Newark was selected, but no doubt the 
government looked upon it as the most central position between Fort Detroit, 
which was still occupied by British troops, and the fortified position of 
Kingston ; however, it was only a temporary arrangement, and he was but a 
few weeks in the country before he decided to establish the Capital in a better 
and safer locality. Newark was moreover a centre of Loyalist population, and 
no doubt this was one reason why Governor Simcoe summoned the Parliament 
to meet there. Besides he believed in the government being conducted with 
considerable pomp and ceremony, and the soldiers from Fort Niagara would 
serve to give dignity to the opening of Parliament. 

At this time there were, besides the Loyalists about Newark, some ten 
thousand English speaking inhabitants in other parts of the Province and ten 
thousand Indians, all faithful to the British. He was ruler over a vast 
country with a sparse population, but he came to it with the intention of 
building up a magnificent province in the heart of the continent, one which 
in time would be a worthy rival of the best of the New England States. He 
summoned his first parliament to meet on September 17. It was at an 
awkward time, for Canada was then altogether an agricultural country, and 
the members of the Legislative Assembly found no slight difficulty in leaving 
their farms at a season when their crops needed their undivided attention ; 
but sufficient of them gathered together, having travelled in some cases 
hundreds of miles in canoes and through trackless forests to permit the 
business of the country to be done. 

The Parliament was opened with a display that made a deep impression 
on the English, and the Indians who assembled in some force for this 
momentous occasion. In his opening address Governor Simcoe showed how 
well he had in the few months he had been in the West forecast the probabil- 
ities of the Province of Upper Canada. "The natural advantages," he said, 



184 BUILDERS OP CANADA. 

''of the Province of Upper Canada' are inferior to none on this side of the 
Atlantic. There can be no separate interest through its whole extent. The 
British form of government prepared the way for its speedy colonization, and 
I trust that your fostering care will improve the favorable situation, and that 
a numerous and agricultural people will speedily take possession of the soil 
and climate, which, under British laws and the munificence with which His 
Majesty has granted the lands of the Crown, ofier such manifest and peculiar 
encouragements. 

The first session of the Legislature did not close until October 15, 1792, 
and in the month of its session many of the most important measures that 
have shaped the destiny of Canada were introduced. The two most important 
things it did, however, were to establish English law and Trial by Jury. 
When the Assembly was dismissed Simcoe set to work to devise ways and 
means for rapidly developing the Province, and of making the people under 
his rule comfortable in their new life. 

He was an aristocratic ruler, and took a paternal interest in every one in 
the Province, but the U. E. Loyalists were his favorite subjects, and to them 
he gave the best lands and the best offices. From the beginning of his rule 
he put forth every possible effort to attract them to Upper Canada. His aim 
was to plant along the border of United States, from one end of the Province 
to the other, a compact line of loyal subjects who would serve as a barrier to 
protect Canada should war, a thing he thought inevitable, again arise. He 
had an eye to the military future of the country and, largely for the purpose 
of having centres of organization in time of need, he had Lieutenants of 
counties appointed. He seems to have had a high opinion of the savages ■ 
and did everything in his power to make them feel that he was their friend 
and father. It was fortunate for him at this time that in Western Canada 
Chief Joseph Brant, Thayendanegea, an Indian of exceptional power and tact, 
was looked up to by the tribes then living in Upper Canada. Simcoe while 
Governor was to be brought much in contact with this great chief, and as 
years went on they mutually grew in respect for each other. 

British troops were still in possession of Fort Detroit and Fort Niagara, 
both of which places were properly within the territory of the United States. 



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JOHN GRAVES SIMCOI. 187 

In the winter of 1793, Simcoe felt called upon to visit Detroit on a tour of 
inspection. The journey had to be made through almost pathless forests and 
he determined to take it by stages, making his first stop at Chief Brant's 
celebrated Mohawk village on the Grand River. He left Navy Hall, Newark, 
on February 4, and reached the Grand on the 7th of the month. Here he 
received a most enthusiastic welcome from the Indians, and especially from 
Brant to whom he brought a letter of introduction from the Duke of North- 
umberland. He stayed with the Mohawks for three days and proceeding on 
his way visited the Delaware Indian village on the Thames. He then 
continued his journey to Detroit, where, on February 24, he reviewed the 
Twenty-Fourth Regiment and carefully and critically examined the fortifica- 
tions. On his return journey he once more paid Brant a visit which 
increased the great chief's admiration for the first Governor of Upper Canada. 

When the Governor's party reached Navy Hall he had fully made up 
his mind that Newark was not the place for either the Government House or 
the Capital of the Province. Toronto seemed to him much more favorable for 
the temporary capital, although that place, too, though comparatively remote 
from the American border, was open to attack from the front. He had 
already made up his mind to choose some inland spot where the Americans 
could only bring an army with great diSiculty, and where the people of 
Upper Canada would have ample time to concentrate their forces to resist 
invasion. A spot on the banks of a little inland stream was chosen as the 
most suitable place, and he named the spot after the venerable Capital of 
England, and the river after England's most celebrated one. Meanwhile, on 
May 2, he set out to investigate the site of Toronto. The town and 
township of Toronto had been planned before Simcoe came to Canada and 
from th^ first he had been so favorably impressed with the spot that he 
determined to give the matter of establishing his government there more 
serious thought. After careful investigation he concluded to take up his 
residence on the banks of the Don, but the Legislature was to continue to 
meet at Newark while he remained Governor of Upper Canada. 

At the second session of the Legislature which opened May 31, 1793, 
Simcoe urged on the people the necessity of organizing and remodelling the 



188 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

militia. He spoke in enthusiastic praise of the British Constitution and 
impressed upon the people the need of cultivating loyalty. He feared 
American invasion, and expected that sooner or later Niagara would be 
attacked, and he was desirous of having the country not only prepared to 
resist invasion, but, if possible, to win back much of the territory lost during 
the Revolutionary war. This second session closed early in July, and at the 
end of the month Simcoe moved to Toronto and took up his permanent 
abode in a tent especially made for the conditions of the climate, and in this 
tent he spent his first summer and winter in Toronto while he looked about 
for a suitable place on which to erect a Government House. Shortly after 
he moved from Newark to Toronto news came of the great victory of the 
Duke of York over the French, and Simcoe seized the occasion to do honor 
to the Duke by changing the name of the new settlement to York, and so, on 
August 27, the place was rechristened. 

The first meeting of the Executive Council was held at the garrison in 
August, 1793, but no effort was yet made to change the place of meeting of 
the Legislature — a thing, by the way, to which the Loyalists of Newark 
vehemently objected. 

At this time there were practically no houses at York, the people dwelt 
in tents in the wilderness, but the axe and the saw were at work, and along 
the border of the fine harbor which now fronts the fairest city of the 
Dominion rude log habitations were springing up. 

During the first year in York Simcoe was much pleased with the 
number of Loyalists that flocked into his Province. The country was likely 
to have a large population sooner than he expected. Many came from the 
United States direct, but many more had journeyed from distant New 
Brunswick whence they had fled when the war was concluded. It is true 
that in numerous cases they were in the direst poverty, but the Governor was 
considerate of them and gave orders for their support where there was real 
need. With a great ruler's foresight he saw that Toronto, whether it was to be 
the permanent capital of the Province or not, was to be the centre of trade 
with the west. At present the only road for commerce was along the great 
lakes and rivers and the traders to reach the great portage had to pass through 



JOHN GRAVES SIMCOB. 



189 



American territory. He believed that a shorter and better road could be 
established, and to this end in canoes and on foot he explored the wilderness 
north of Toronto. His explorations were not without result and on this trip 
he planned Yonge Street leading from York to the Georgian Bay by way of 
Lake Simcoe, and in the following year the Queen's Rangers were set to work 
to open up that great highway. He was a great promoter of road-making, 
and about this same time planned a military road from one end of the 
Province to the other. He carefully mapped out such a road and named it 
Dundas Street. A portion of the road was constructed, and so confident 
were many of the settlers that a great highway would in a few years be 
completed that they settled along the proposed route. Had he remained in 
Canada it no doubt would have been finished, but his departure brought 
disappointment to many of the settlers. Those who followed him in 
authority thought more of their own aggrandisement and that of their 
friends than of the development of the Province. 

Governor Simcoe meanwhile had been looking about for a suitable 
spot on which to erect a permanent abode and found a place that 
pleased him on the banks of the Don. He decided to build Castle 
Frank — so named in honor of his eldest son. The "Castle" was a 
log house, a fine product of the backwoods, but from its position and object 
was not unworthy of the name. Dr. Henry Scadding in his Toronto of 
Old gives the following description of this celebrated building : 

" Castle Frank itself was an edifice of considerable dimensions, of an 
oblong shape ; its walls were composed of a number of small, carefully hewn 
logs, of short lengths. The whole wore the hue which unpainted timber, 
exposed to the weather, gradually assumes. At the gable end, in the 
direction of the roadway from the nascent capital, was the principal entrance, 
over which a rather imposing portico was formed by the projection of the 
whole roof, supported by four upright columns, reaching the whole height of 
the building and consisting of the trunks of four good-sized, well-matched 
pines, with their deeply chapped, corrugated bark unremoved. The doors 
and shutters to the windows were all of double thickness, made of stout 
plank, running up and down one side, and crosswise on the other, and 



190 BUILDERS OF CANADA, 

thickly studded over with the heads of stout nails. From the middle of the 
building rose a solitary massive chimney-stack." 

Castle Frank was to be a place of great hospitality, and indeed both at 
Castle Frank and Navy Hall the doors were ever open and all visitors were 
bountifully received. The Iroquois at Niagara gave Simcoe the title of 
Deyonguhokrawen, which, being interpreted, means, "one whose door is 
always open." And the Indians were not the only ones to be impressed by 
the Governor's hospitality. The American commissioners who came to 
Canada with regard to the boundary difficulty were his guests at Navy Hall, 
and afterwards spoke with enthusiasm of the reception their ancient enemy 
gave them. He was, indeed, a veritable knight of the old school. 

The most critical question that presented itself during his period of 
government was the contention that continued between the Indians and the 
Americans with regard to the Indian territory in the United States. An 
unwise move on his part might have precipitated a war, but with such 
diplomacy did he act that he was able to hold comparatively aloof and at the 
same time keep the respect of his Indian allies. Yet he showed no fear of the 
Americans and when ordered by Lord Dorchester to proceed to the foot of the 
Maimi rapids and to erect a fort on the disputed territory he unhesitatingly 
did so, notwithstanding the clamour that was raised by the Americans with 
regard to the action on the part of the British. He was careful at all times to 
protect English interests and to prevent American aggression; however, the 
danger that had been threatening ever since he came to the country was to 
come to an end, and by a treaty concluded between England and the United 
States the former agreed to evacuate the territory in dispute. 

Soon after this Simcoe was forced by the needs of the home government 
to leave Canada. St. Domingo demanded the presence of a strong man and 
an experienced soldier, and on December 3, 1796, Major-General Simcoe 
(he had received this rank in 1794) was appointed official governor of that 
place and commander-in-chief of the army, with the local rank of lieutenant- 
general. It must have cost him a good deal of pain to leave Upper Canada, 
His work there was really just begun. Yonge Street had been opened up to 



JOHN GKAVES SIMCOK. 191 

Lake Simcoe, and he no doubt soon hoped to see it completed, and Dundas 
Street well under way. 

Besides this he was creating a " Royal Navy " on the lakes, and already 
had a number of gunboats on Lake Ontario, and had planned for ten more 
for that lake and an equal number for Erie; but duty demanded his presence 
elsewhere, and he went to St. Domingo with the hope of speedily recovering 
the ground the British troops had lost in that island. 

General Simcoe arrived at St. Nicholas Mole at the beginning of March, 
1797, and immediately went to work to seek a remedy for the evils he found 
existing. He made but little headway; the force under his control was 
altogether inadequate for the situation and he returned to England to secure 
reinforcements or to abandon the task which had been assigned him. His 
efforts bore little fruit as Britain at that time had her resources severely taxed 
by the critical state of affairs in Europe owing to the ambition of the great 
Napoleon, and could not waste her energies on St. Domingo. That his services 
in the island were not without appreciation is evident from the fact that in 
October, 1798, he was made a lieutenant-general in the British army. 

In 1801, there was a rumor throughout the British Isles that the French 
were preparing to invade Great Britain ; the country naturally became 
niuch excited, and along the coast anxious eyes were turned towards France. 
Tidings of gigantic preparations being made to invade England were 
wafted across the channel. Strong men were needed in . the sea-port 
towns and the command of Plymouth was entrusted to General Simcoe. 

"We hear little more of Simcoe until August, 1806, when the English 
government learned that the French were about to invade Portugal with an 
army of thirty thousand men. The authorities thereupon resolved to send an 
army to the Tagus, and this military force was entrusted to Lord St. Vincent 
and Lieutenant-General Simcoe. These distinguished oflScers had full power 
conjointly with Lord Rosslin to negotiate with the Court of Lisbon. This was 
to be General Simcoe's last commission. On the voyage to Portugal he was 
taken seriouly ill and was forced to make a speedy return to England. When 
the ship that brought him back reached Torbay he was moved to Topham. 
He had only a few days to live and died on the 25th of October, 1806. He was 



192 



BUILDERS OF CANADA. 



still in his prime and his loss to England was a great one. He was a man of 
unsullied career, and of fine military knowledge and of great daring. Besides 
• these qualities he possessed a diplomacy which made him an excellent ruler ; 
certainly Canada has not had among her makers a nobler or more "unselfish 
man, or one who was to do more for the true development of the country 
than the first governor of the Province of Upper Canada. 




THE BUILDING OF THE "GRIFFIN" 

La Salle built this boat and launched it on the lake, near Fort Niagara. It was the first 1 
to spread sails on Lake Erie. 



CHAPTER X. 

JOSEPH BRANT. 

Famous Indians In Canadian History — Joseph Brant a Celebrated Chief — Little Known of His 
Early I,ife — His Father a Mohawk Warrior — His Life Intimately Associated with the Life 
of Sir William Johnson — Brant's First Military Experience at Crown Point — Serves 
Under Sir William Johnson at Niagara — The Education of Joseph Brant at Moor Charity 
School, Lebanon, Connecticut — A Diligent Student — In the Pontiac War — Translates the 
Gospel of St. Mark and the Anglican Prayer Book into the Mohawk Language — Appointed 
Chief of the Six Nations — Leaves the Mohawk Valley on Outbreak of Revolutionary War — 
Visits England — Returns to Canada — At the Battle of the Cedars — His Raids Along the 
Susquehanna — At the Battle of Oriskany — Campbell Misrepresents Him in His " Gertrude 
of Wyoming" — A Description of Brant by an American Prisoner — The Mohawk Valley 
Left Desolate — Brant and His Followers Settle Along the Grand River — A Second Visit to 
England — An Amusing Incident at a Fancy-Dress Ball — The First Church Erected in 
Upper Canada — The Indians Dissatisfied — Brant's Words with Regard to the Indian Land 
Grants — Brant Employed in Negotiations Between the United States and the Indians — A 
Friend of Governor Simcoe's — Hospitably Entertains Visitors at His Home — His Noble 
Dying Words — A Mighty Force in Keeping the Indians of Canada Loyal to Great Britain. 

COMPARATIVELY few Indians stand out prominently in Canadian and 
American history. Tribes have come and gone, have roamed through 
the forest and over the vast western plains, but only at long intervals 
has a commanding figure arisen to stamp history with his name. Three 
chieftains, however, figure conspicuously in the history of Canada^Pontiac, 
Brant and Tecumseh. Of Pontiac, probably the greatest among North 
American Indians, a savage capable of uniting in a common cause the Indians 
from the great plains of the west and those dwelling by the rivers of the 
southern states, there is nothing to be said here as he figured not as a maker 
of Canada, but as one who sought to destroy English power along the 
St. Lawrence. Tecumseh, on account of the active part he took in the war of 
1812, will be dealt with in a separate study. Joseph Brant, Thayendanegea, how- 
ever, is of more importance to the student of Canadian history than either of the 
other chieftains mentioned. Pie was the friend of the English from first to 
last, and at the most critical time in the history of England's great colony, 

193 



194 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

Canada, stood by her through evil report and good report and made great 

sacrifices on England's behalf. 

Of the early life of Joseph Brant but little is known ; even his birthplace 
and parentage are uncertain. He was very probably born on the banks of 
the Ohio river, and his boyhood days were spent in the Mohawk valley. 
Historians differ as to who was Brant's father, but on the whole it is generally 
believed that he was the son of the celebrated warrior, Nickus Brant,a fiill-blooded 
Mohawk of the Wolf tribe. His father was doubtless a chieftain and Brant 
from his earliest days could look forward to being a leader among his people. 
From his boyhood days his life was intimately associated with the life of 
General William Johnson, who did so much by his bravery, and skill as a 
general, and his diplomacy in dealing with the Indians to win the west for 
England during the French wars and who kept the flag of England from 
being driven from the western country during the Revolutionary war. 

When General William Johnson made his celebrated attack on Crown 
Point in 1755, he had in his force three sons of Nickus Brant, the youngest 
of these was Joseph, who at that time could not have been over thirteen or 
fourteen years old. In this fight old Chief Hendrick was slain ani his place 
among the Indians of America was probably taken by Brant's father. As a 
result of the expedition against Crown Point Johnson was knighted and 
received from his king the very handsome gift of £5000. Four years later, 
in 1759, in the final conflict between the French and English for 
supremacy in North America, Sir William Johnson was to play an important 
part. Niagara was then in the possession of the French ; it was one of the most 
important and strongly fortified positions in the west and a considerable 
army was sent against it under General Prideaux. With a force of about 
2000 men this distinguished English general left Oswego on July 1. As he 
journeyed towards the French fort he was joined by Sir William Johnson 
with some 600 warriors of the Six Nations. Other Indians joined the 
expedition and by the time Niagara was reached Johnson had under his 
command a body of probably over one thousand Indians. Young Joseph 
Brant was one of the most reliable red men in the force. Shortly after they 
reached Niagara General Prideaux was killed by the premature bursting of a 




POWDER MAGAZINE, OLD FORT GEORGE 




BUTLER'S RANGERS' BARRACKS 
PLACES OF HISTORIC INTEREST AT FORT NIAGARA 



JOSEPH BRANT. 197 

shell from a Coehorn mortar. The chief command now fell to Sir William 
Johnson. On July 24 a strong relief party appeared on the scene ; it was 
composed largely of men who had spent the greater part of their lives • in 
hunting, trapping and bush-fighting, but Johnson's Indians were too much 
for them, and they were defeated with considerable loss and a number of the 
most celebrated French soldiers in North America were taken prisoners. On 
the following day, July 25, Pouchot, the commander of Niagara, surrendered 
to Sir William Johnson. 

About this time Sir William seems to have been drawn towards young 
Brant, and to have picked him out as a more than ordinary specimen of his 
race. The young warrior, through his intimate association with the 
distinguished English soldier, had already shown an appreciation of civilized 
ways and a desire for mental culture. He was in the confidence of Sir 
William, and was not only being helped by the general, but was used by 
the general to help other Indian youths towards higher and better things. 
The following letter to Mr. Wheelock, a missionary and teacher to the 
Indians shows both Johnson's attitude towards the savages and the esteem 
in which he held young Brant : 

" Fort Johnson, Nov. 17th, 1761. 

"Rev. Sir, — Yours of the second instant I had the pleasure of receiving 
by the hands of Mr. Kirkland. I am pleased to find the lads I sent have 
merited your good opinion of them. I have given it in charge to Joseph 
(Brant) to speak in my name to any good boys he may see, and encourage 
them to accept the generous offer now made them, which he promises to do, 
and return as soon as possible. I will, on the return of the Indians from 
hunting, advise them to send as many as is required. I expect they will 
return, and hope they will make such progress in the English language and 
their learning as may prove to your satisfaction and the benefit of those, who 
are really much to be pitied. My absence these four months has prevented 
my design of encouraging some more lads going to you, and since my return, 
which is but lately, I have not had an opportunity of seeing old or young, 
being all on their hunt. When they come back I shall talk with and advise 



198 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

their parents to embrace this favourable opportunity of having their children 
instructed, and doubt not of their readiness to lay hold of so kind and 
charitable an ojffer. 

Mr. Kirkland's intention of learning the Mohawk language I most 
approve of, as, after acquiring it, he could be of vast service to them as a 
clergyman, which they much want and are desirous of having, 

" The present laudable design of instructing a number of Indian boys 
will, I doubt not, when more known, lead several gentlemen to contribute 
towards it, and enable you thereby to increase the number of scholars, with 
whom I shall not be backward to contribute my mite. 

"I wish you all success in this undertaking, and am with truth and 
sincerity, "Rev. Sir, 

"Your most humble servant, 

"Wm. Johnson." 

About the time of the expedition against Niagara the Moor Charity 
School had been established for the education of young Indians at Lebanon, 
Connecticut. Dr. Eleazer Wheelock, who was to be the first president of 
Dartmouth College which grew out of this school, was in charge of the 
institution. Sir William, who believed that the Indians might be both 
Christianized and civilized, selected a number of young Mohawks and sent 
them to Dr. Wheelock's school. The brightest and most earnest among the 
boys was Joseph Brant. He made rapid progress and showed great aptitude 
for Latin and Greek, and in 1762, when Rev. Charles Jeffrey Smith, a young 
man of wealth and enthusiasm, went as a missionary to the Mohawks he 
selected Brant as his interpreter. Brant was to have a short experience with 
the missionary, however. At this time the Pontiac war broke out and the 
young Mohawk, having lost none of his natural desires for the war-path, 
joined a company against the confederated Indians. According to the Rev. 
Mr. Kirkland h© was most useful in the war and " behaved so much like the 
Christian and the soldier that he gained great esteem." This was writt&n 
about" 1766 and the writer adds that at that time Brant was living " in a 



JOSEPH BEANT. 199 

decent manner and endeavoring to teach his poor brethren the things of God 
in which his own heart seems much engaged. His house is an asylum for 
the missionaries in that wilderness," 

The efforts of the missionaries to educate Brant were not wasted. He 
was very helpful to them in their work and did much to elevate the savages 
with whom he came in contact. After he settled in Canada and was living 
in retirement . there, in the hope of bettering the spiritual condition of the 
Indians under his control, he translated both the Gospel of St. Mark and the 
Anglican Prayer Book into the Mohawk language. During the course of his 
life he was frequently employed by Sir William Johnson in public business 
that demanded energy, wisdom and a cultivated mind. 

So highly was he esteemed by the Indians that, in 1771, when about 
thirty years old, he became war-chief under the title of Captain Joseph Brant, 
the highest military distinction known to the Indians. He now ruled over 
the Six Nations — the Mohawks, the Senecas, the Oneidas, the Cayugas, the 
Onondagas and the Tuscaroras. These tribes formed a strong confederacy 
and each one had over them a separate chief, but Brant held supreme 
command over the united nations. 

When the Revolutionary war broke out Colonel Guy Johnson was forced 
to leave the Mohawk valley. With him went a number of Indians, chief 
among whom was Brant. They reached Montreal in the summer of 1776 
and hoped to organize a sufficient force to regain the Mohawk valley. For 
some reason the force was never organized ; and instead of undertaking a 
military expedition against the rebels Guy Johnson went on a visit to 
England and took with him Brant. The chief attracted a good deal of 
attention in London from all with whom he came in contact The speech which 
he delivered before Lord George Germaine setting forth the grievances of the 
Indians under his chieftainship was widely commented on. In the spring 
of 1776 he returned to America and landed somewhere in the vicinity of New 
York. He proceeded to Canada and after many narrow escapes joined the 
British forces that were in pursuit of the Americans who had given up the 
hope of capturing Quebec, He was present at the Battle of the Cedars when 
Major Isaac Butterfield and 390 men surrendered to Captain George Foster. 



200 BUILDEES OF CANADA. 

The greater part of the force opposing the Americans at this time were 
Indians. They considered they had great grievances against the invading 
army and were desirous of massacring the men who had fallen into their 
hands, but Brant opposed such a course and succeeded in saving the 
prisoners. 

In the following year Brant carried the war into the enemy's country 
along the Susquehanna, and won many Indians to the support of the English 
cause. General Herkimer of the " Continental " army had an interview with 
him and endeavored to get him to at least remain neutral, but Brant would 
not listen to the pleadings of his old friend, and declared that he would 
remain faithful to his king. For a time his forces were joined with those of 
General John Butler and Sir John Johnson, and he likewise led 300 warriors 
in the expedition under General St. Ledger against Fort Stanwix. 

Upon one occasion General St. Ledger learned from Molly Brant of the 
approach of a rebel army under General Herkimer. An ambuscade was 
formed and the enemy fell into the hands of Captain Brant and his Indians. 
A thunder storm arose and prevented the destruction of the entire force. This 
was the celebrated battle of Oriskany, a battle claimed as a victory by both the 
English and the rebels. In 1778 Brant was once more on the Susquehanna 
and his name became the terror of the settlers living in that region. He was 
recognized by his enemies as a powerful warrior who rarely failed in an 
enterprise and his name was associated with many barbarous deeds of which 
he was not guilty. American historians have done him grave injustice and 
the English poet Campbell in his Gertrude of Wyoming speaks of him as " the 
monster Brant." " the accursed Brant " on account of the part he is supposed 
to have taken in the massacre of Wyoming, but Brant took no part in the 
massacre and Avas not even present when it occurred. The truth with regard 
to Brant is that on the whole he was most humane and on numerous 
occasions went out of his way to save the lives of prisoners who had fallen 
into the hands of his savage followers. 

On one of his raids he captured, among other prisoners. Captain 
Jeremiah Snyder who has given us the following interesting desciiption 
of this renowned Indian : " He was a likely fellow of a fierce aspect, tall 



JOSEPH BRANT, 201 

and rather spare, well spoken and apparently about forty years of age. 
He wore moccasins, elegantly trimmed with beads — leggings and breech-cloth 
of superfine blue — short green coat, with two silver epaulets, and a small, 
laced, round hat. By his side hung an elegant silver-mounted cutlass, and 
his blanket of blue cloth, purposely dropped on the chair in which he sat, 
to display his epaulets, was gorgeously decorated with border of red." 

Until the end of the Revolutionary war Brant played a conspicuous part 
in the border raids to the north and west of Albany, and when the treaty of 
peace with the United States was signed in 1783, he found himself without a 
home. The appearance of the ]\Iohawk valley was that of " a widespread, 
heart-sickening and universal desolation." When the war terminated the 
Mohawks had a temporary resting-place where Lewiston now stands on the 
American side of the Niagara river. The Senecas offered them lands in their 
country, but Brant and the Mohawks " were determined to sink or swim with 
the English." The Chieftain proceeded to Quebec and secured a tract of land 
on the Bay of Quinte, but this was unsatisfactory to the tribe, and the Grand 
River was finally chosen for the home of the Mohawks and others of the Six 
Nations in Canada. In order to have his people settled to the best 
advantage. Brant decided to visit England, and arrived in London in 
December, 1785. He was received with even greater enthusiasm than on his 
first visit, and, on account of the important part he had taken in the 
Revolutionary war, was entertained by those in authority and introduced to 
the king. 

Indians, as a rule, are lacking in a sense of humor, but on one occasion 

Brant showed himself capable of appreciating a practical joke. He was at a 

fancy-dress ball, but unlike the other guests, was without a mask. He went 

in his dress as a chieftain and warrior, painted, his plumes nodding in his 

head-dress and his tomahawk at his belt. Another of the guests, struck with 

his appearance, in a playful manner reached forth his hand and took hold of 

the nose of what he doubtless thought to be a mask. Brant saw the fun of 

tiie situation, seized his tomahawk and, brandishing it over the head of the 

individual who had taken such a liberty with his person, sent forth a 

blood-curdling war-whoop, such as was never heard before or since in an 
12 



202 BUILPKKS OV CANADA. 

Enfflisli ball-room. It is said tJiat many of the guests left the room in fright, 
but when the matter was explained thoy returned, and the evening proved 
all the more enjoyable for this extraordinary incident 

When Brivut returned to Ctmada from England in 1786, he at once 
began to put fortli strenuous etibrts to build up a prosperous nation on the 
banks of the Grand Eiver. He had led his warriors successfully in battle, 
tvnd he was now anxious in time of peace to civilize them. To this end he had 
a church erected, — the first church built in the Province of Upper Canada, 
Difficulties soon arose between the Indians and the government with regard 
to the disposal of the Indian lands. These lands tliey could hold and use, 
but could not deed them away without tlie consent of the government — 
a very wise condition, as time htis prove^l. This Brant looker! upon 
as an injustice, and while he remained the strong friend of the 
English, stood by the Indians in their contention with regard to their 
rights over the soil. A proclamation was issued forbidding the sale or 
leasing of their lands by the Indians, and Brant, with other chiefe and 
warriors, met at Niagara to plead with tlie government for justice. The 
speech which he delivered on that occasion shows how strongly he felt with 
■ regard to the matter, and at the same time how loyal he was to England. 

" In the year 1775," said he, " Lord Dorchester, then Sir Guy Carleton 
at a numerous council, gave us every encv>uragement, and requested us to 
assist in defending their country, and to take active part in defending His 
Majesty's jx^ssessions, stating that when the haypy day of peace should arrive, 
and should we not prove successful in tlu :; >:. that he would put us on the 
same footing on which we stood previous to joining him. This flattering 
promise was pleasing to us, and gave us spirit to embark heartily in His 
Majesty's cause. We took it for grante^l that the word of so great a man, or 
any promise ot a public nature?, would ever be held sacred. We were promised 
our lands for our services, and these lands we ^ ere to hold on the same footing 
with tliose we fled ftoni at the commencement of the American war, when we 
joined, fought and bled in your cause. Now is published a proclamation 
forbidt.ling us leasing tliose very lands that were positively given us in Heu of 
those of which we were the sovereigns of the soil. Of those lands we have 



JOSEPH BRANT. 203 

forsaken, we sold, leased, and we gave away, when and as often as we saw 
fit, without hindrance on the part of your government, for your government 
well knew we were the lawful sovereigns of the soil, and they had no right 
to interfere with us as independent nations." 

Difficulties arose between the Indians and the government of the United 
States with regard to the boundaries of the Indian lands. In this dispute 
Brant and his Mohawks took no part, although during the years 1791 and 
1792 Brant was employed as a neutral in negotiating between the disputants. 
He visited Philadelphia in 1792 and was given a cordial welcome by the 
President of the United States, and made a deep impression on many of the 
leading men in the young republic. 

When Colonel Simcoe was appointed Governor of Upper Canada he 
visited Brant and was much impressed with this noble red man, and during 
the entire time of his sojourn in Canada a close friendship existed between the 
two. 

But Brant was to see no more active service. The rest of his life was to 
be spent quietly in his Mohawk village, ruling his people with a firm but 
kindly hand. His house was ever open to visitors and any who sojourned 
with him were deeply impressed with his lavish hospitality and his dignified 
deportment. He ever had the interests of his Indians at heart, and when, on 
a bleak November day in 1807, he died, those near his bedside heard him 
mutter with his dying breath " Have pity upon the poor Indians ; if you can 
get any influence with the great, endeavor to do them all the good you can." 

He had during his life done them much good, and that for over a 
hundred years the Indians in the community he established have remained 
peaceful, law-abiding subjects of Great Britain has been largely due to the 
influence which lived on after his death. That his services have been 
appreciated is shown by the magnificent monument to his memory that stands 
in the heart of the thriving city of Brantford. 



CHAPTER XI. 

GENERAL ISAAC BROCK. 

Brock one of the World's Military Heroes— First sees Active Service la Holland— With 
Nelson before Copenhagen — Comes to Canada in 1802 — Believes War between United 
States and Great Britain Inevitable — Made a Brigadier-General in 1808 — Sent to the 
Province of Upper Canada — War Declared — Brigadier-General Hull Marches into Canada 
— Brock Ready to Meet Him — Tecumseh an Ally of the British — Hull Withdraws His Men 
to Detroit — Brock Resolves to Attack Detroit — Hull's Ignominious Surrender — Brock 
Fears for the Safety of the Niagara Frontier — An Armistice Agreed Upon — Brigadier- 
General Van Rensselaer Hopes to Capture Queenston Heights — Efforts to Cross to the 
Canadian Shore — A Battle in Progress — Brock Gallops to the Scene of Conflict — The 
Death of Brock— The Gallant Stand of the Americans — A Glorious Victory for the 
Canadian Soldiers— On the Day of His Death Brock Created a Knight for His Victory at 
Detroit — The Americans at Fort Niagara Give their Tribute erf Mourning to the Gallant 
Dead. 

IN the year 1769 three of the world's military heroes were bom, Napoleon, 
Wellington and our own Brock. The last named, from his earliest years, 

had set his heart on a military career, and began his life's work as an 
ensign at the age of sixteen. In a little more than seven years his noble 
character and sterling intellect had advanced him to the rank of Lieutenant- 
Colonel of the 49th, a regiment with which he was to be identified till the day 
of his death. 

He first saw active service in Holland, where, at the battle of Egmont- 
op-Zee, he acquitted himself with great courage, and where he narrowly 
escaped death. He was with Nelson, too, in the Baltic, and proved himself 
both a wise soldier and careful commander at Copenhagen, 

But his career began in earnest when his regiment was ordered to Canada 
in 1802. After three years service in this country he was made a 
colonel, and returned to England on leave of absence to visit his friends. 
But his heart was in Canada and his stay in the Old World was to be cut 
short. 
204 



GENERAL ISAAC BROCK. 207 

From his arrival in this country he felt that sooner or later the 
American? and British would come to blows, and while he was in England 
news cprae across the waters that made him tremble for his adopted home. 
Wiihont delay he sailed for Canada, and on his arrival began to make the 
defences as secure as possible. Darker and darker grew the war cloud, and 
fearing that in case of an invasion the Americans would make Quebec their 
first point of attack he had it strengthened by every means in his power. 

Brock grew in popularity both in Canada and in England. He was the 
idol of his men and he was deemed such a worthy commander that in 1808 
he was made a brigadier-general. In 1810 he was sent to the Upper 
Province, and established himself at Fort George on the Niagara frontier. 
This district was in such close proximity to the United States that an invasion 
was to be expected here, and Brock carefully examined the whole frontier, 
studying the country and making preparations for the struggle that must 
take place. 

In the year after hia arrival in the Upper Province, Francis Gore, 
Lieutenant-Governor of Upper Canada, went to England, and General Brock 
was left in entire control of the Province, being first both in civil and military 
affairs. 

On the 18th of June, 1812, the long anticipated war was declared, and 
seven days later Brock received word of it at Fort George. He at once saw to 
the defences of the entire West, visiting in person every important point from 
Niagara to Detroit. The eastern frontier, with Kingston as its chief point, was 
in equally imminent danger and this district he placed under the command 
of an able officer, Major-General Shaw. 

The blow was not long in falling. On the 12th of July, Brigadier- 
General Hull marched into Canada with a strong force, and issued a 
proclamation threatening dire vengeance to all who dared resist his progress, 
and promising peace and plenty to those who would aid himu Brock was 
not in the least alarmed, and replied to his arrogant threats that England was 
ready, not only to defend, but to avenge all her subjects, whether red or 
white. And the Province was prepared to aid him in making good his reply. 
No sooner was the invasion known than men fi:om all districts rushed to his 



208 UUILDKUS OK CANADA. 

standanl, and he soon had more soldiei-s than he could supply with arms, 
tmd huiidrods had to return disappointed to their homes. 

Hull had not the success he expected. The Canadians held aloof from 
him, and he soon found himself in a foreign country with a large body of 
troops., and without means of providing food for them, except by carrying it 
long distances. He sent letters by Major Van Home to the American 
lieadquarters, in which he stated his difficulties, and added further that his 
army was in a demoralized condition. Proctor was in command at 
Amherstburg, and hearing of Van Home's mission, sent out Tecumseh, a 
brave Shawnee chief, to intercept him. Tecumseh was successful, and 
captured not only a large amount of spoil, but the very important letters that 
had been intrusted to Van Home. AVhen news of this disaster reached 
Hull, he became alarmed for his own safety on Canadian soil, and on the 7th 
and 8th of August witlidrew his men to Detroit, after having wasted a 
month. 

All this time Brock had been busy making hurried preparations at York 
(Toronto). On the 6th of August all was ready, and he set out for 
Burlington Bay. After a severe and fatiguing journey by day and night, 
across a rugged country, and in boats that oflered no shelter from the 
weather, he drew up his squadron of a little over three hundred men at 
Amherstburg on the night of August loth. Here he received the 
correspondence Tecumseh had captured, and, when he learned of the weak 
state of the American force, he determined to strike a quick, sure blow. 

Hull was at Detroit, and, although the fort was a strong one, Brock 
hoped to take it by a prompt assault. He sent Tecumseh with six hundred 
warrioi"S across the river, and that wily Indian placed his men so as to cut off 
all communication with the fort. The night after the successful passage of 
Tecumseh's forces was a dark one, and, under cover of the darkness, the 
Canadian boats plied across the river. At the first grey of morning thre« 
hundred and thirty regulars and four hundred militia who made up in 
eagerness what they lacked in experience were drawn up at Springwell, four 
miles below Detroit Brock summoned Hull to surrender. The American 
genera] took two hours to deliberate and then sent back a refusal. Without 



GENERAL ISAAC BBOCK. 209 

delay the Canadians advanced; they were confident of success and eager for 
a fight. The main body while it advanced was ably supported by Tecumseh's 
braves on the left flank, and by a small vessel of war, the " Queen Charlotte," 
on the right. 

The untried York Volunteers were thrown forward as a skirmishing 
party, and so vigorously and bravely did they do their work that the 
Americans hurriedly abandoned a strong outpost, and retreated to the fort, 
leaving behind them two twenty-four pounders. They brought such an 
exaggerated report of the numbers of the enemy, that, just when Brock had 
his men in readiness for an assault, Hull sent out an officer with a flag of 
truce, and surrendered without a struggle. Detroit was won, and with it was 
given up the whole of Michigan Territory, a ship of war, thirty-three 
pieces of cannon, abundant stores, one stand of colors, a military chest, and a 
large body of troops. News of the victory soon spread through Canada ; 
Brock's name was on every lip, and all felt that the country was safe while it 
had such a brave and dashing commander to lead its hardy sons to battle. 

Although victorious at Detroit Brock had great misgivings for the safety 
of the Niagara frontier. Brigadier-General Van Rensselaer was stationed 
there with a strong force, and prompt action was, in Brock's mind, the only 
thing that could save Canada at that point. But an armistice was agreed 
on between the foes, and Brock had to go to Niagara, and remain there 
deploring the inactivity that only gave his enemies a chance to concentrate 
their forces and get in supplies. But the armistice was of short duration, and 
early in October the two peoples were at war once more. 

A spy who had ventured into the British camp brought to Van 
Rensselaer the false information that Brock had left Niagara for Detroit. 
The American general knew the spirit of the man opposing him, and hoped 
in his absence to take the strong position known as Queenston Heights. 
This spot, one of the most picturesque in Canada, is a noble plateau rising 
two hundred and fifty feet above the Niagara River. It is to the West what 
Quebec is to the East of Canada ; a natural fortress that a few brave men 
might defend against an army. But Van Rensselaer had a strong force and 
did not hesitate to attempt its capture. 



210 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

On the 11th of October he made an effort to cross to the Canadian shore, 
but utterly failed. Two days were spent in preparations and by the loth all 
was ready. Early in the morning, before the autumn sun had risen to glorify 
the gorgeous foliage of the maples, the thunder of cannon was heard. 
General Van Rensselaer at the head of a few brave men was attempting the 
passage. Two companies of the 49th, and two hundred soldiers of the York 
Militia were energetically opposing them. An eighteen pounder, on a place 
of vantage on the cliff swept the river with a deadly fire ; but the Americans 
protected their men by a strong battery of four pieces, and the first detach- 
ment was soon across with but few casualties. Busily the boats plied, and 
before long thirteen hundred men were drawn up in order of battle. It was 
to be a fight to the death. General Van Rensselaer was no coward, and 
though wounded in four places cheered his men on to the conflict. 

Brock was at Fort George. He had been expecting an attack, and when 
at daybreak he was aroused by the roar of cannon, he knew that his troops at 
Queenston Heights w^ere in danger. In a few minutes he was in the saddle, 
and galloping furiously to the battle-field. He did not check his horse until 
he reached the eighteen-pounder battery that had been placed to sweep the 
river but which was now useless, since the Americans had crossed. Here he 
dismounted and swept the field with a general's eye. Suddenly the rattle 
of musketry above him told that the enemj' had gained the height, and he 
and his staff were compelled to desert their position. 

Captain Wool and a number of American soldiers had scrambled up a 
fisherman's path and had won a position one hundred and eighty feet above 
the river. Lustily they cheered as the Canadians deserted the gun, and 
calmly they awaited Williams of the 49th, who came against them with one 
hundred men. These soldiers were compelled to retire with great loss, but 
they were joined by others, and rushed again to the battle, driving the 
Americans to the edge of the precipice. The position was a trying one, and 
some of the soldiers attempted to raise a white flag but Wool tore it down in 
great anger and urged his men on to the fight. Brock was now at the head 
of a strong party, and as he gallantly rushed up the height shouting " Push 



GENERAL ISAAC BROCK. 211 

on the brave York volunteers," a ball struck him in the breast and he fell. 
Unmindful of himself, thinking only of his adopted country, he begged, with 
his dying breath, that his death should be kept from his men. 

On pushed the volunteers under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel 
McDonnell, but this noble fellow, too, received a mortal wound and the 
Canadians had to retire to await reinforcement ; but not before the Americans 
had lost many brave soldiers, and so crippled were they that unless help 
came from the opposite shore they must either surrender or plunge into the 
river below. 

General Sheaffe, in command at Fort George, was rapidly speeding to 
the fight with three hundred regulars, two companies of militia, and a few 
Indians, On his way he was reinforced by a number of others, and about 
noon he reached the Heights with eight hundred men. 

The Americans were now encircled by a strong force, determined to 
avenge their fallen commander, and by the Niagara. Their friends offered 
them no assistance, and as the Canadians came to the final charge they 
awaited their fate like Spartans. The men were commanded to hold their 
fire until the enemy were within forty yards. Soldiers were stationed in the 
rear of the troops to shoot down any man who fired before the w^ord was 
given. Steadily the foe advanced, and calmly the Americans awaited them ; 
when they were almost upon them a deadly, telling fire swept the hill. But 
there was no stopping the rush and in a few minutes the Heights were won. 
Some surrendered ; the hill was strewn with dead and dying and many brave 
fellows who would not yield cast themselves into the stream, and in their 
effort to escape perished in the ruthless waters. 

The victory was a noble one, but Canada wept over it. Her heroic 
Brock was no more, and she deemed the battle dearly bought. England, 
too, had recognized his worth, and on the very day of his death the guns of 
the Tower of London roared forth rejoicingly over hw victory at Detroit, and 
his sovereign made him a Knight of the Order of the Bath. Even his 
foes had learned to respect their brave enemy, and, on the day of his funeral, 
the commander of Fort Niagara hoisted his flag at half-mast, and fired minute 
guns, shot for shot, with the Canadian mourners. 



CHAPTER XIL 

TECUMSSH 

Tecumseh a Bitter Enemy of the United States — Elskwatawa, a Brother of Tecutnseh's, announces 
Himself a Prophet — Tecumseh Aims at Forming a Mighty Indian Confederacy — His Speech 
to His Red Brethren — General Harrison Defeats Tecumseh's Indians at Tippecanoe — 
Tecumseh Joins the British in the War 1812 — Proves Himself an able Leader under 
Brock — Favorably Impresses the General and His Staff — Captain Glegg's Pen-Picture of 
Tecumseh — Brock Confides His Plans of Attack on Detroit to Tecumseh — The Great Indian 
Warrior Draws a Map of the Country About Detroit — Humane to The Prisoners who Fell 
into His Hands — An Incident Showing the Generosity of Tecumseh — A Chief Mourner on 
the Death of Brock — The British Meet With Reverses — Proctor Retreats to Moraviantown — 
Determines to Give Battle to the Americans — Tecumseh on the Day of Battle — The 
Wretched Generalship of Proctor — Flees to Burlington Heights — ^The Death of Tecumseh. 

TECUMSEH, the friend of the British, was born about the same year as 
Brock, and was a member of the Shawnee tribe, living in the valley 
of the Miami, in Ohio. The Americans had for years been encroaching 
on the Indian lands, and from his youth Tecumseh endeavored to put a stop to 
their inroads. Before his twenty-iifth year he had several times faced the 
" long knives," as he called the American soldiers, and had proved himself a 
valiant foe. In 1794 the Indians suffered a severe defeat, and were compelled 
to surrender a large portion of their territory. This made Tecumseh an even 
bitterer enemy of the Americans than he already was, and, with a vigor and 
intelligence not often seen in a savage, he endeavored to form a league among 
the Indians to compel the white men to surrender the land already seized, 
and to keep them from advancing farther west. 

In 1804 his brother, Elskwatawa, announced himself a prophet, and 
warned his red brethren that if they wished to regain their old power they 
must lead the life of their fathers who inhabited this continent before the 
whites appeared among them; that they must cast away their woollen 
garments, and clothe themselves in skins ; and that they must entirely give 
up the use of ardent spirits, 
212 



TECUMSEH. 213 

llie fame of this prophet soon spread through the Indian villages and a 
vast concourse of savages came to dwell near one who was believed not only 
to be sent by the Great Spirit, but who, it was held, had the power of 
working miracles. 

It is difficult to tell whether Tecumseh believed in his brother's 
supernatural powers, but at any rate he used the belief of others to unite all 
in his confederacy. The authorities, becoming alarmed, ordered Tecumseh 
and his brother to change their homes, and they removed to the Wabash, 
where the work of uniting the people went on. 

A brief extract from a speech delivered by Tecumseh before a large 
assemblage of braves will give some idea of the character of the man and his 
aims. 

" Brothers, — We are friends ; we must assist each other to bear our 
burdens. The blood of many of our fathers and brothers has run like water 
on the ground, to satisfy the avarice of the white men. We ourselves are 
threatened with a great evil ; nothing will pacify them but the destruction of 
all the red men. 

"Brothers, — We must be united; we must smoke the same pipe; we 
must fight each other's battles ; and more than all, we must love the Great 
Spirit ; he is for us ; he will destroy our enemies, and make all his red 
children happy." 

In 1811 the Americans under General Harrison met Tecumseh's Indians 
at Tippecanoe in the absence of their chief, and utterly defeated them. This 
defeat rankled in the breast of Tecumseh, and, when, in the following year, 
war was declared between the United States and Britain, he was one of the 
first to rush to the British standard ; with him went an immense following, 
ready to fight to the death against their lifelong enemies. 

Tecumseh was soon to see active service. General Brock was unable to 
proceed to the scene of action at once, and so dispatched Colonel Proctor with 
a number of men to take command at Amherstburg. Proctor, wishing to 
strike the enemy a blow, sent across to Brownstown — a village twenty-five 
miles from Detroit — a part of the Forty-First Regiment and a number of Indians 
under Tecumseh. Major Van Home was known to be on his way from 



214 BFILPEE? OF CANADA, 

Detroit "vnth important papers, and Tecumseh and seventy of his braves lay 
in anionsh. hoping to take him prisoner. When the Americans reaohed their 
place of hiding the Iii:^;i.iii suddenly sprang npon them, and in the short 
battle that followed the troops were completely routed. Many of them were 
killed and the important dispatches were seized by Tecumseh. In a few days 
Hull, in command at Detroit, sent a strong force against the foe at Brownstown, 
and compelled tiiem to retreat to their own side of the river. 

On the 18th of August Brock reached Amherstburg, and the Indians, 
learning that so brave a soldier had arrived, began firing their guns to show 
their joy. But powder was scarce, and Brock, a nx ious to save it, sent for their 
chief, — for whom he ever after had the greatest admiration. Tecumseh came, 
and after a short conversation with Brock saw that the firing ceased. 

The chief made such an impression on the General and his staff that one 
of the aides-de-camp. Captain Gl^g, has given us a faithful pen-picture of him. 

" Tectmiseh's appearance was very prepossessing ; his figure, light and 
finely proportioned ; his age I imagine to be about five and thirty ; 
in h eig ht £ve feet, nine or ten inches ; his complexion, light copper ; 
countenance, oval with bright hazel eyes, beaming cheerfulness, energy and 
decision- Three small silver crowns, or coronets, were suspended from the 
lower cartilage of his aquiline nose ; and a large silver medallion of George the 
Third, which I believe his ancestor had received from Lord Dorchester, when 
Governor-General of Canada, was attached to a mixed colored wampum string, 
that hung roond his neck. His dress consisted of a plain neat uniform, 
tanned deer-skin jacket, long trowsers of the same material, ilie seams of 
boiii being covered with neatly cut Mage ; and he had on his feet leather 
moccasins, much ornamented with work made from the dyed quills of the 
porcupine." 

On the following day Brock called a council at which about one thousand 
Indians were present Brock spoke lovingly to the red men, and told them 
that their gr^t fiither over the ocean had sent hi m to aid them in their fight 
against the " long knives " ; he finished his speech by saying that he soon 
hoped to drive H'jJl fix>m Detroit His speech was joyfully received by the 
warriors, and with one voice they c-alled upon Tecomseh as a fitting brave to 



.§ 





TECUMSEH. 217 

reply to so noted a leader as the English general. Tecumseh replied with 
suitable words, and closed an eloquent speech by saying that all present were 
ready " to shed their last drop of blood in their great father's service." Other 
speeches were made by noted chiefs, and all only reiterated the words of their 
leader. Brock was so deeply impressed by Tecumseh's wisdom that he 
determined to take him into his confidence, and after the council was ended 
he led him apart with several other chiefs, and told them of a proposed plan 
to attack Detroit at once. 

Nothing could have pleased Tecumseh better. In Detroit were the 4th 
U. S. Infantry, a part of the troops which had laid his village waste and 
slaughtered his braves at Tippecanoe. 

Brock asked the chief if he could give him a description of the country 
about Detroit. Without a moment's hesitation Tecumseh took a piece of 
birch bark, spread it on the ground, placed a stone on each corner to keep it 
in position, and with a scalping-knife sketched upon it an accurate plan of 
the district, locating hills, woods, rivers, roads and morasses with the skill of 
a trained military engineer. Brock was delighted, and deemed that the best 
course would be to send Tecumseh and his warriors across the river to take 
up a position in the woods before sending over his regulars and militia. 
After the capture of the fort Brock feared that the Indians might fall upon 
the Americans and slaughter them, but to a hint of the kind Tecumseh 
replied, with great haughtiness, " I despise them too much to meddle with 
them." All through the war he seemed to have not only a restraining hand 
upon his own tomahawk and scalping-knife, but to have been able to hold 
in check his fellow-warriors when prisoners fell into their hands. 

The British leader was so pleased with the conduct of the brave Shawnee 
at the capture of Detroit that he took off his silken scarf, and wound it round 
the body of his red friend. On the following day Tecumseh was seen without 
it. Brock wondered at this as the chief had expressed, in his stoical way, 
great pleasure at the honor his general conferred upon him, — and, on 
inquiring, learned that he had given it to Round-head, a Wyandot chief, who^ 
he claimed, was an elder and abler warrior than himself. 



218 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

All through this year he fought bravely, and when Brock fell at 
Queenston Heights, he had no sincerer mourner than the chief who had learned 
to love him as a worthy brother warrior. After the general's death he lost some 
of the enthusiastic hope he had had in British arms, but he still fought 
on, never once playing the coward's part ; and, when the war was waged with 
increased vigor in 1813, no hero stands out more prominently than this 
noble red man. 

In this year the British met with severe reverses, and Proctor in 
command at Detroit, was compelled to desert that stronghold and fall back 
upon Canadian soil. Tecumseh was with him, and with a heavy heart 
joined in the flight until an Indian village, known as Moraviantown, was 
reached. Here they received intelligence that the enemy was rapidly coming 
down upon them. Proctor had retreated hastily and with great lack of 
forethought. The very bridges he crossed were left standing, and his 
worn-out troops were no match on the march for the lightly-armed Kentucky 
riflemen that served under General Harrison. 

The Americans greatly outnumbered the Canadians, but Proctor 
determined to make a stand on the banks of the Thames, and give them 
battle. His men were drawn up in a favorable position ; on the left flank 
was the Thames, on the right an impassable cedar swamp. From the river 
to the swamp the distance was in all about five hundred yards, and in the 
centre of this space Proctor planted the only gun — a six-pounder — that he 
had managed to bring with him. Tecumseh and his warriors were posted in 
the swamp, where the mounted infantry of the Americans could not advance, 
and where their trusty rifles might work havoc among the foe. When all 
was ready Tecumseh took leave of Proctor with the encouraging words, 
" Father 1 have a big heart !" and joined his warriors to await the signal 
to begin the fight, which was to be the firing of the gun. 

Never did warrior present a more heroic picture. His every movement 
bespoke the soldier, and as he joined his braves all eyes turned trustingly to 
the commander who, for two years, had led them through so many hard 
fought fights. This day was an important one for him, and while the British 
officers donned their uniforms bedecked with gold and silver lace he rolled 



TECUMSErf o-g 

his handkerchief in the form of a turban, and a, a mark of his rank stuck in 

^thout making any effort to entrench or protect hi, men by barricades 

Lr " '"" '"' ^'""^^ "-f'^ «- 'o »-* " protecting 

Stealthily the enemy adranced, sheltering themselves by the trees erowin^ 

l''rz ' "" ^'T °" ''' ''''^' '- -^ '''- X^^' 

and exhausted by their trymg march, gave way before the impetuous charge 
and the gun was soon in the hanrls nf th^ a ■ „ pt^^uous cnarge, 

was lost and loft th « ^^ 7 Americans. Proctor saw that all 

was lost, and left the field m headlong flieht nor diM h^ =t„ *-i i 
safe at Burlington Heights. ^ """' ^^ "^ 

While the right division of the foe had been sweeping evervthin;, in ih. 

draw the Indians from their strong position and twenty brave fellows with 
their Colonel advanced into the very "jaws of death " T„i *' f'^^ -'* 
to rptnm ir. i,;„ ^J■ h '' "• Johnson alone lived 

12 rushe r r- 7""' ^°' '"^^ •'^''^^^' "-^-"y^-i a' ti^- fi-t 

~; seemed to b' *"• '"'"'^ "" '°"^" ™*'" ■^''-«- <=--?- 
giving ground. Johnson, the commander, was wounded in four places and 
as he reeled in the saddle from loss of blood, Tecumseh dashed th^ul"' 
foWra and endeavored to strike him down with his tomahawk Th 
Amencan leader's pistol was in his hand and as the blow was about to 

red men fell dead, with four buck shot, and a bullet in his breast 
fath J ^^ r ^f ^^ Tecumseh's son, a boy of seventeen, who was at hi, 
fether side when he fell, fought on bravely, but were at l^t comp^Ifed to 
surrender, and the entire field was in the hands of their foea 



CHAPTER XIII 

THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON. 

By F. Blake Crofton. 

Birth and Parentage of Haliburton— His Education— Called to the Bar— In the Nova Scotia 
House of Assembly — Censured by the Assembly — Succeeds his Father as Judge— His 
Windsor Home — Takes up his Residence in England— Receives the Degree of D.C.Iy. from 
Oxford University — Represents Launceston in the Imperial House of Commons — Not a 
Brilliant Parliamentarian — His Literary Work — His Influence on Longfellow's picture of 
the Acadian Expulsion— Contributes to " Eraser's Magazine "—Haliburton a Lover of Fun 
— Conservative in his Ideas and Instincts — Yearns for a Fuller Imperial Citizenship for the 
Colonies — "Sam Slick" a Brilliant Piece of Humor— Artemus Ward Terms Haliburton the 
Founder of the American School of Humor — General Summing up of his Achievements. 

THOMAS Chandler Haliburton, until recently the most noted writer born 
in British North America, was the son of William Hersey Otis 
Haliburton, Chief Justice of the Inferior Court of Common Pleas, as 
his office was ponderously styled, and of Lucy, daughter of Major Alexander 
Grant, one of Wolfe's officers. He was born in Windsor, N. S., on the 17th 
of December, 1796. He was educated in his native town at the Grammar 
School, and subsequently at King's College, graduating (B. A.) in 1815. In 
1820 he was called to the Bar, and practised his profession for some years in 
Annapolis, which he represented in the Nova Scotia House of Assembly from 

1826 to 1829. One of the most notable incidents of his career in the 
Provincial Legislature was his warm, eloquent and successful pleading in 

1827 for the abolition of the test oath, containing a declaration against 
transubstantiation which debarred devout Catholics from holding public 
office. His persistent efforts to obtain a grant for Pictou Academy, which 
was more than once voted by the House of Assembly and thrown out by the 
Council, led to his characterizing the latter body in a newspaper as " twelve 
dignified, deep-read, pensioned old ladies, but filled with prejudices and 
whims like all other antiquated spinsters." For this the Council demanded 
220 



THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON. 221 

an apology from the House, which was at first refused ; but, on the Council's 
more preremptorily repeating its demand, the House passed a resolution of 
censure, which is thus recorded in its journals, April 4, 1827 : 

''Thomas C. Haliburton, Esq., one of the members for the County of 
Annapolis, being called upon and having admitted that he did in this House 
speak the words compla^ped of by His Majesty's Council, and afterwards 
published the same : 

"Resolved, therefore, unanimously: That the House do consider the 
conduct of the said Thomas C. Haliburton on that occasion as highly 
reprehensible, and that Mr. Speaker do pass the censure of this House upon 
the said Thomas Haliburton by publicly reprimanding him therefore at the 
Bar of this House." 

Haliburton duly appeared at the Bar and received the reprimand. But 
he felt the snub so much, or thought the back-down of the House so 
disheartening, that he finally abandoned his efforts on behalf of the Pictou 
Academy and by so doing provoked much bitter criticism, which has not 
ended with his life. This apparent desertion of a cause which he had so 
vigorously championed was doubtless one of the reasons which led the 
government to resist his claim for a pension, until, some years after his 
retirement from the Bench, the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council 
decided in his favor. In 1829 he succeeded to his father's judgeship and 
soon after removed to Windsor, N. S., where he occupied a pretty villa named 
" Clifton," whose grounds adjoined those of King's College. In 1841 he was 
appointed Judge of the Supreme Court. He retired from the Bench in 1856 
and took up his residence in England, intending to devote himself 
exclusively to literature. The University of Oxford gave him the honorary 
degree of D. C. L in 1858, and he was elected a member of the Athen^um 
Club. 

From 1859 to 1865 he represented Launceston in the Imperial Plouse ol 
Commons. In Parliament Haliburton acted as the representative rather of 
British North America than of his English constituency, and he several times 
combated the then disposition of many statesmen to get rid of the Colonies. 
But he did not make the mark in the Plouse which the admirers of his 

1 O 



222 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

writings expected. The truth is that, even in his prime, his ordinary 
speeches were little above the average, though parts of his set orations were 
powerful and impressive in the extreme. But none of his best speeches were 
made in the House of Commona In 1859, when he was elected for 
Launceston, he was over sixty-two years old — an age at which most eminent 
men, having regard to their reputation only, would be wise to rest upon their 
laurels. And Haliburton had been too self-indulgent a liver to be 
exceptionally vigorous at the beginning of his old age. Besides, by this time, 
his success had probably made him too self-complacent to think it needful to 
give much thought or labor to his speechea His tendency to wander from 
the subject had increased. Commenting on a speech of his made in 
Committee of Ways and Means, April 25, 1861, Mr. Bemal Osborne observed 
that he had " touched upon nearly every topic except the issue which is 
immediately under our consideration. The honorable and learned gentleman 
is a man famous for his literary ability," continued Mr. Osborne, " and as the 
author of works of fiction which are universally read ; but I must say that, 
after the exhibition which he has made to-night, he had, in my opinion, 
better undertake another edition of The Rambler" 

Haliburton's last years ffere spent in Gordon House, Isleworth, a 
beautiful and historic villa on the Thames, a mile or two from Richmond. 
There he died on the 27th of August, 1865, and was buried in the 
neighboring churchyard.* 

The four books by Haliburton which narrate the sayings and doings of 
the celebrated Samuel Slick, of Slickville, are, in their chronological order : 
The ClockmakeTt The AttachS, Wise Saws, and Nature and Human Nature. Two 
others. The Letter Bag of the Great Western and The Bubbles of Canada, are 
expressly attributed to Mr. Slick as their author, as may be gathered from 
the last letter in the former and from the dedication of the latter work ; and 



• Haliburton married (i)I,oui8a, daughter of Captain Neyllle, late 19th Wght Dragoons, and (s)Sanili Harriet, 
daughter of W. M. Owen, Esq. (of Woodhouse, Shropshire), and widow of B. H. Williams, Esq. (of Baton 
%Iascott, Shrewsbury). He left no issue by his second wife. His children, besides two or three who died young, 
ere Robert Grant Haliburton, Q.C., the litterateur ; Sir Arthur I,., created I,ord Haliburton of Wlndsor.N. 8., 
for some years Permanent Under-Secretary for War ; Susan, married to the late Judge Weldon of New 
Brunswick ; Aug'usta, married to a cousin ; l,aura, married to William Cunard ; Emma, married to Revertad 
Bainbridge Smith ; Amelia, married to Very Reverend Edwin Gilpin, Dean of Nova Aootia. 



THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON. 223 

publishers have placed the name of Sam Slick on the covers of The Old 
Judge, The Season Ticket, American Humor, and Americans at Home. 

The first series of The Clockmaker, which appeared first in the Nova 
Scotian in 1835 and 1836, was published in book form in Halifax and London 
in 1837. The second series was issued in 1838 ; the third in 1840. In 
most later editions the three series make one volume. The cute dodges of the 
Clockmaker in pushing his trade are said to have been reminiscences of 
suits tried by Haliburton, and brought by an itinerant vendor of clocks for 
the payment of notes given him for his time pieces. In the first chapter of 
The Attache its ostensible writer speaks of The Clockmaker as an accidental 
hit, a success which he did not purpose to imperil by experimenting in other 
literary lines. " When Sam Slick," he says, " ceases to speak, I shall cease to 
write." But Haliburton's seif-confidence grew with his fame, and he failed 
to keep this modest resolution. The Attach^, the two series of which appeared 
respectively in 1843 and 1844, was probably suggested by Dickens' American 
Notes, which had been published early in 1842. After deprecating Slick's 
lively indignation at the latter book, " The Squire " observes, in The Attache : 
" If the English have been amused by the sketches their tourists have drawn 
of the Yankees, perhaps the Americans may laugh at our sketches of the 
English." The sub-title of this book, " Sam Slick in England," has been 
made the only title, dn some editions. This last remark may be made also of 
Wise Saws and Modern Instances, which has been given to the public, at least 
once, under its second title of " Sam Slick in Search of a Wife." The first 
edition of Wise Saws was published in London in 1853, and its continuation. 
Nature and Human Nature, which followed in 1855, concluded the record of 
the sayings and doings of the redoubtable Sam Slick. 

Haliburton's first work was his Historical and Statistical Account of Nova 
'Scotia, published in Halifax in 1829, for which he received a vote of thanks 
from the House of Assembly. There is now no doubt that the author's 
History tinctured Longfellow's picture of the Acadian expulsion. " The 
poet," says his brother and biographer, " read such books as were obtainable ; 
Haliburton, for instance, with his quotations from the Abb6 Raynal." But 
raa^. not the pubHcation of Haliburton's History have been a link in the 



224 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

chain of incidents that led to the inception of Evangeline^ The tale of 
the separated Acadian lovers, it is well known, was told to Longfellow by 
Hawthorne, who had heard it from his friend, the Rev. H. L. Conolly, at 
one time Rector of a church in South Boston. "The incident had been 
related to him by a parishioner of his, Mrs. Haliburton," writes the Rev. 
Samuel Longfellow. This lady was Mrs. George Haliburton, an aunt by 
marriage of the author. Is it not likely that her attention was first drawn to 
the Acadians by the touching description of their virtues and their woes in 
the History written by her nephew? Pathetic separations of kinsfolk are 
dwelt upon in Haliburton's chapter on the expulsion, particularly in the 
" humble petition " from the Acadian exiles in Pennsylvania. 

Our author's second historical work was The Bubbles of Canada, a series 
of letters on the Imperial Colonial policy, published in 1837, while his third 
and last was Rule and Misrule of the English in America, which appeared in 
1851. The Letter-Bag of the Great Western, or Life in a Steamer, first published 
in 1839, is a collection of letters supposed to be written by various passengers 
from England to America in the famous steamship of that name. These 
letters contain, not only comments upon life at sea, but the writers' reflections 
on the country they are leaving, or the country they are going to — a plan 
which enables the author to present us with some lively studies in his favorite 
subject, human nature. 

In 1846 and 1847 Haliburton contributed to Frazer's Magazine a series of 
papers, which in 1849 were collected in the book entitled 2%e Old Judge, or 
Life in a Colony. This work depicts various phases of life in Acadia in the 
earlier part of this century. As in the " Sam SHck " series, the plot is a 
mere thread on which to string facts, jests and opinions. The Old Judge's 
opinions, by the way, seem to march pretty closely with Haliburton's own. 
Traits of American Humor and Americans at Mome (also published under 
the title of Yankee Stories) are merely collections of tales, mirthful or 
marvellous, edited by Haliburton, but culled from American books and 
periodicals. 

His latest work was The Season Ticket^ a series of miscellaneous notes 
made and conversations reported by Mr. Shegog, the holder of a season ticket 



THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON. 227 

on an English railway. The papers which comprise this work were first 
published anonymously in the Dublin University Magazine in 1858 and 
1859. The Season Ticket shows that Haliburton's Conservative and 
Imperialistic views, and his opinions of the resources and needs of Nova 
Scotia and Canada were not materially changed in his old age. In this book, 
too, we may be sure that the author expresses himself absolutely without fear 
or favor, for it was evidently designed to remain anonymous. Otherwise he 
would hardly have been bold enough to make a gentleman (p. 123) group 
him with Dickens and Thackeray. 

Haliburton loved fun and showed his love of it even on the Bench. His 
tastes and instincts were both conservative and aristocratic. He disliked 
innovations unless they were unquestionable improvements. He disapproved 
of voting by ballot and of universal suffrage. To the latter he makes Mr. 
Hopewell trace the repudiation of their debts by certain States of the Union. 
In his historical works he even opposed the granting of responsible 
government to the colonies. He held that the tyranny of mobs and 
majorities may be quite as bad and unbearable as that of despots. 

Politics, thought Haliburton, is a poor and over-crowded business, 
especially in the colonies. He lamented that his countrymen devoted too 
much attention to this petty game, and he exhausted his stores of epigram 
and ridicule to open their eyes to the fact. 

Space forbids an adequate account of his famous criticisms, chiefly by 
the mouth of " Sam Slick," upon the remediable weaknesses of Nova Scotians. 
He found many of them surrounded by industrial openings and yet waiting 
inertly for governmental panaceas or wasting their energies in clamoring for 
them. But, though he freely criticised his countrymen's faults with a view 
to their reform, he also recognized and handsomely advertised the many 
advantages of his native province. To attain the prosperity which nature 
seemed to have destined for them, he thought Nova Scotians only wanted 
more industry and more confidence in domestic enterprises, with less devotion 
to politics, less false pride (which set some people against agriculture and 
other honorable industries) and less self-complacency, that they might 
recognize their faults and reform them. 



228 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

Looking far ahead of his contemporaries, Haliburton was strongly in 
favor of federating the Empire. He compared it to a hoopless barrel whose 
staves must be bound together more securely or else tumble to pieces, and to 
a bundle of sticks that needed to be tied more firmly or they would fall apart. 
His ideal moralist yearned ** to see colonists and Englishmen * * united as 
one people, having the same rights and privileges, each bearing a share of the 
public burdens, and all having a voice in the general government," 

He seems to have fretted under the subordinate status of the colonies, 
and to have yearned for a fuller Imperial citizenship. ** No, don't use the 
word ' our ' till you are entitled to it," says the Clockmaker. " Be formal and 
everlastin' polite. Say ' your ' empire, * your ' army, etc., and never strut 
under borrowed plumes." Elsewhere he has compared the colonies to ponds 
which rear frogs, but want only inlets and outlets to become lakes and 
produce fine fish. He thought the main cause of discontent among gifted and 
self-reliant colonists was the lack of openings for genius and ambition. He 
argued that the representation of the colonists in the Imperial Parliament 
would also serve to prevent dangerous disaffection — their representatives 
would be " safety valves to let off steam." He thought the North American 
olonies had already reached a period in their growth " when the treatment of 
adults should supersede that of children " ; but he was not one of those who 
wished to accept the full privileges of manhood and shirk its obligations and 
responsibilities. 

" Sam Slick," his most noted creation, is in most respects a typical, wide- 
awake Yankee. He is versatile and shifty. He loves to best a body in a 
trade — especially when the other party thinks himself knowing. He wants 
to turn everything to practical use, and at Niagara is struck first by the 
water-power, and secondly by the grandeur of the Falls 1 He flatters, 
wheedles and *' soft-sawders " everlastingly ; but he never cringes to anyone. 
He is a past-master of slang, and is quoted widely, in illustration of 
colloquialism, in Bartlett's Dictionary of American Slang. He is flippant, 
sometimes to the verge of irreverence and indelicacy. He is a shrewd and 
close observer ot character as well as of externals, of classes as well as 
individuals. Proud and boasti\il of his country, he sees some of its faults 



THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON. 229 

and dangers, and criticizes it freely himself. But he resents the criticisms of 
foreigners, especially of superficial observers who think they know everytliinj:; 
in a few weeks. These gentry he sometimes " bams " with such shocking 
tales as The Gouging School or The Black Stole. He is so sublimely 
self-conceited as to be unconscious of the failing; but his boastfulness is not 
wholly due to his conceit. He sometimes brags because "it saves 
advertising." "I always do it," he confesses, "for, as the Nova Scotia 
Magistrate said, who sued his debtor before himself, ' what is the use of being 
a Justice if you can't do yourself justice?' " 

In some of his opinions, however, Mr. Slick is certainly not the typical 
Yankee of his time. He pours ridicule on the mock modesty and suggestive 
squeamishness of New Englanders. "Fastidiousness," he says, "is the 
envelope of indelicacy." He detests cant and distrusts those who use it. 
Hypocrisy, he thinks, "has enlisted more folks for Old Scratch than any 
recruitin' sergeant he has." He is opposed to Prohibition and notes some of 
the humbugs then as now connected with it. " Puritans," he says, " whether 
in or out of church make more sinners than they save by a long chalk. They 
ain't content with real sin. Their eyes are like the great magnifier at the 
Polytechnic, that shows you awful monsters in a drop of water, which were 
never intended for us to see, or Providence would have made our eyes like 
Lord Rosse's telescope." 

To believe that any human being, much less one who starts life under 
considerable disadvantages, could know all that Mr. Slick says he knows 
would tax one's credulity overmuch. He is equally at home in the politics 
of England, Canada and the United States. He paints, he plays the piano 
and the bugle, he dances, he is skilled in woodcraft and angling, he rows and 
paddles neatly, he shoots like Leather Stocking or Dr. Carver. He can 
speculate in any line with equal success. He has a fair smattering of 
medicine and chemistry. He offers a hawker of cement a much better 
receipt of his own invention. He has been in almost every country, 
including Poland, South America and Persia. In the latter country he has 
learned the art of stupefying fishes and making them float on the surface. 
He dyes a drunken hypocrite's face with a dye he got from the Indians in the 



^30 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

" great lone land " ; and when the hypocrite repents he has a drastic wash 
ready to efface the stain. '* I actilly lamed French in a voyage to 
Calcutta," he says, "and German on my way home." He knows a little 
Gaelic, too, which he learned on a new and agreeable system that, 
unfortunately, would never do in the Public Schools. 

Granting that the typical Jack-of-all-trades in his time was the inquisitive 
and acquisitive Yankee, yet Sam Slick beats the record of his shifty 
countrymen. He has been everywhere where a lively reminiscence can be 
located and is endowed with any art or attainment that comes in handy " to 
point a moral or adorn a tale," to snub a snob or help a friend. He 
understands every phase of human nature, and is impossibly familiar with 
every social stratum. 

Artemus Ward was not without warrant in terming Haliburton the 
founder of the American school of humor, for most of its phases, from the 
affected simplicity of Mark Twain to the malapropism of Mrs. Partington, are 
illustrated in his works. About fifteen years before the publication of Uncle 
Tom's Cabin, Topsy's famous phrase was anticipated in the first series of The 
Clochmaker (C. 12), where a country girl, being asked where she was brought 
up, answered : " Why, I guess I wasn't brought up at all, I growed up." 
Not only phrases but anecdotes and tales have been borrowed from 
Haliburton by modern humorists. One might even argue, spitefully, that 
he furnished the model for " Peck's Bad Boy," for there is in The Letter Bag 
an epistle from a youth who plays a series of tricks almost as nefarious as 
those of Peck's monstrosity. 

Haliburton pointed the shafts of his sarcasm usually at types and classes, 
seldom at individuals. He saw an unoccupied field for a satirist at home and 
he proceeded to occupy it. " The absurd importance attached in this country 
to trifles," observes one of his characters, "the grandiloquent language oi 
rural politicians, the flimsy veil of patriotism under which selfishness strives 
to hide . . . present many objects for ridicule and satire." He used dialogue 
copiously as a means to make his writings popular. " Why is it," asked 
Sam Slick, "If you read a book to a man you set him to sleep? Just 
ber»AU8e the language ain't common. Why is it if you talk to him he will sit 



THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON. 231 

up all night with you ? Just because it's talk, the language of natur'." And 
written chat, he evidently thought, was the most effective medium next to 
oral chat for holding the attention of all classes. Haliburton had a great gift 
for aphorism and quaint conceits, and was never at a loss for an apt or 
grotesque simile. 

It is not unlikely that he might have taken rank among the 
very greatest- literary names of the century if he had been a little less genial 
and self-indulgent, or if he had had higher educational advantages and a more 
stimulating literary environment at the outset of his career. As it was, 
HaHburton generally wrote forcibly, and often smoothly and classically, while 
in detached passages he could be terse and even brilliant. But the attractions 
of his style are not sustained, and he is sometimes a little slip-shod or diffuse. 
He is accordingly more to be admired as a humorist than as a stylist, and 
still more, perhaps, as a thorough student and an acute judge of human 
nature. He intuitively recognized the tendencies of the age; he observed 
the currents of public opinion, and gauged their volume and their force with 
approximate correctness. 

His Hterary faults include discursiveness, repetition, inconsistency in 
his characters, lack of thoroughness in his researches, a few somewhat 
indelicate jests. But these faults bear but a small ratio to the merits of this 
great Canadian writer— to his exuberant humor, his acute observation, his sound 
judgment, his wide horizon, and the general beneficence of his aims. And if 
some too industrious hands— some other hands than mine— shall at any 
future time undertake to unfold his venial frailties in more detail, true 
Canadian sons of the Empire will not forget that he believed in guarding 
forever the imperial birthright whose grandeur he was great enough to 
understand. * 



• A Hterary society was organised In 1884 In connection with Klng't Collejre. Windsor N S >n<l «««,.^ ti, 

Haliburton Club. It has published two volumes: the first, a pL^t^y theT;e^e^^w"te^^^tl S 

Haliburton: The Man and the Writer"; the second. " HaHburton :\ Centenary S apM.-^ The lat tris 

mustratedand coutams. with four other papers, a complete bibliography compiled by J P. Anderson of the 

oTufworZ""'"^""" "'°''"^^'^'^^^^ '''''-'''' '° '^^ author and of English and foreS^t^ 



CHAPTER XIV. 

HOX, JOSEPH HOWE. 

The Late Principal Grant's Estimate of Joseph Howe — Howe's I^ove for Nova Scotia and Her 
People and His Far-Reaching Influence — Sabine's Account of the Enthusiasm for "Jo 
Howe " — His Father a United Empire Loyalist of Boston — A God-Fearing Man— Joe 
Howe's Tribute to His Father's Memory — The Birthplace of the Great Reformer — A Child 
of Nature — His Education — Learns the Printing Trade — A Poet of Considerable Power — 
Purchases the " Nova Scotian " — Attacks the Abuses of His Time — Howe's Far-Reaching 
Influence as a Journalist — The Nova Scotia " Family Compact " — Mr. George E. Fenety's 
Description of the Council — Howe's Familiarity with the Whole Province — His Marriage — 
A Serious Illness — His Celebrated Trial for Libel — Elected to the Assembly — Begins the 
Great Battle for Responsible Government — The Stubborn Attitude of the Council— Howe 
Moves a Series of Twelve Reform Resolutions — His Brilliant Eight Hour Speech in the 
Assembly — Joe Howe in a Duel — The Council, Enraged at Resolutions, Refuses to Pass 
Supply Bill — Howe Appeals to the Secretary for the Colonies — Sir Colin Campbell 
Opposed to Responsible Government — Lord Falkland Replaces Him — Howe Makes an 
Enemy of Lord Falkland — Howe's Life Among the Farmers of Musquodoboit — His 
Influence Upon the Material Prosperity of Nova Scotia — His Attitude Towards Confedera- 
tion — His Great Detroit Speech — Takes Office Under Sir John Macdonald — Appointed 
Lieutenant-Governor of Nova Scotia — His Death. 

THE late Principal Grant in his powerfal sketch of the character and 
career of the Hon. Joseph Howe, which appeared in The Canadian 
Monthly nearly twenty-eight years ago, calls that great reformer " Nova 
Scotia incarnate." At first this may seem but a half truth, for during many 
long years Howe was bitterly opposed in his reforms by a large and influential 
section of the people of the Atlantic Province of the Dominion. But these 
people were, for the most part, alien to the soil. They were not Nova Scotians, 
but native born Englishmen or United Empire Loyalists who formed a species 
of ''Family Compact" in the land where they had pitched their tents, and 
who despised the natives of the Province, looking upon them as only fit to be 
hewers of wood and drawers of water to the dominant class. Joseph Howe, 
or *' Joe Howe," as he was more familiarly called, was trul;y representative of 
the masses of Nova Scotia. They lovea nim and ne them ; ana me ocean- 
232 



HON. JOSEPH HOWE. 233 

washed shores, the tide-tortured rivers, the barren places, and the fruitful 
valleys of his native land were dearer to him than any other places 
on earth. 

No other Canadian— not even Sir John Macdonald or Sir Wilfrid Laurier 
—has had such enthusiastic worship from his followers. Through his paper 
and in parhament he talked to them -about politics, and trade and 
agriculture ;" he made them " laugh a good deal " and " think a good deal 
more " even while they were laughing. He formed them ; his thoughts were 
their thoughts, and the freedom they ultimately possessed was brought about 
by him and they reverenced him as at once their friend and the shaper of 
their ideals. 

Sabine in his Loyalists of the American Revolution admirably shows the 
enthusiasm there was, in the forties, throughout the length and breadth of 
Nova Scotia for the man who had done by pen and tongue what Mackenzie 
and Papineau failed to do by force of arms in Upper and Lower Canada. 

" It was ' Jo Howe ' by day and by night," writes Sabine. *' The Yankee 
peddler drove good bargains in ' Jo Howe ' clocks. In the coal mine, in the 
plaster-quarry, in the ship-yard, in the forest, on board the fishing pogy, the 
jigger and the pinkey, it was still ' Jo Howe.' Ships and babies were named 
'Jo Howe.' The loafers of the shops and taverns swore great oaths about 
* Jo Howe.' The young men and maidens flirted and courted in ' Jo Howe ' 
badges, and played and sang 'Jo Howe' glees. It was 'Jo Howe' 
everywhere." 

Joseph Howe was of United Empire Loyalist stock,— Puritan stock at that. 
At the time of the American Revolution, his father, John Howe, was 
employed as a printer in Boston. He worked for a Mrs. Draper who was 
publishing the Boston News-Leiter when the flames of revolution broke out. 
Mrs. Draper seems to have been a loyal Britisher, and when the British troops 
evacuated the city, in 1776, she moved her printing plant to Halifax and 
there established the Nova Scotia Gazette. She took with her John Howe, 
who, for some four or five years, managed her business. In 1781 he branched 



284 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

out for himself and issued the first numbers of the Halifax Journal. He was 
a man of force and integrity and rapidly won the confidence of the leaders in 
his adopted Province and was appointed Postmaster of the Province. 

John Howe was a God-fearing man who assembled his children about 
him for worship morning and night, and who on the Sabbath went forth , 
with his Bible under his arm to minister to his little flock of Sandemanians 
in an " upper room." He was much beloved by his family, and set them an 
example of generosity to the poor and sympathy with the erring. His purse 
was ever open to those in need, and he regularly visited the prisons to help 
the fallen ; and frequently when prisoners were set free they found a resting 
place at his home until they could secure employment. To the end of his 
days he remained the same generous, God-fearing, true-hearted Christian, 
and in his charitable work, in his declining years, received assistance from his 
son Joseph. His children held their father's memory in reverence and much 
of the beauty and goodness of Joe Howe's character was due to the fact that 
he looked up to his au^ere and kindly father and ever found delight in his 
society. The following stanza written to his half-sister, Jane — and Joe Howe 
was no mean poet — well shows what a dutiful and loving son he was : 

" oil, how we loved him, love him now, 

Our noble father ! By his side 

My mother, who my faults would chide ; 

With cares domestic on her brow, 

More wayward, and of sterner mood, 

But ever provident and good ; 

Hating all shams, and looking through 

The Beautiful to find the True." 

His father was the predominating influence in his life. He had been to 
him an instructor, a play-fellow, a daily companion, to use the words of his 
illustrious son who could say of him : " He was too good for this world ; but 
the remembrance of his cheerfulness, his childlike simplicity and truly 
Christian character is never absent from my mind." From his father, who 
was to the end a Loyalist and a Tory, Joe Howe inherited not a little of his 
Toryism and a great deal of his love of the Empire. It is true that during the 
course of his life Howe seemed the opposite of a Tory, but ever under the 
surface was that love for established institutions, for monarchical form of 




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HON. JOSEPH HOWB. 237 

government, that Conservatism that is the mark of the Tory. His brothers 
were pronouncedly Conservative, and, it Ib said, voted and worked against 
him both in his campaigns in the city of Halifax and throughout the 
Province. 

This illustrious Nova Scotian was born in 1804 in a one-and-a-half 
story house which was situated on the eastern bank of the North-West Arm 
of Halifax Harbour. It was a beautiful spot with the Atlantic coming in 
and flowing out, stirring the imagination of the youthful dreamer. The 
rugged shores, the forest-clad slopes fronting his home and the sandy bays 
were to him sources of perpetual joy. Wordsworth, with all his love for 
nature, was not more deeply impressed by his surroundings than was this 
young Nova Scotian. He delighted to fish and to swim in the streams, to 
gather wild flowers in the meadows. He loved to go forth with rod and gun 
and spear and he spent much of his time sailing on the waters of the harbour 
near his home. As a result he grew up robust in frame and with an ardent 
love of nature. 

His home was situated at a considerable distance from Halifax, and he 
found it no easy matter to attend school regularly. However, up to his 
thirteenth year he went to school in the city during the summer months, but 
in the winter season was forced to remain at home. He was not a brilliant 
student, and to many of his comrades he seemed to be " a regular dunce." 
At thirteen he was apprenticed to the printing trade in the office of the 
Gazette under his half-brother, John. He was now to lay the foundation of 
his future career. 

At this time Halifax was intensely aristocratic ; no upstart could find an 
entrance into the charmed circle of society in the dty. The leaders in this 
society drew large salaries and spent the money with a lavish hand among 
the despised trades-people of the Province. Government House was the centre 
of this aristocratic life, and it was the aim of every young Nova Scotian to 
win an entrance to that exalted place. The printer's apprentice could have 
but little hope. However, he had something that neither wealth nor ancestry 
can purchase — ^genius. "While still under twenty he tried his hand at poetry, 
and one poem of his, Melville Itland, gained the notice of the lieutenant' 



238 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

Governor. So strong was it and so much promise did the Lieutenant-Governor 
see in his lines that he invited the young printer to Government House. No 
doubt Mehille Island and the reception it got had much to do with shaping 
Howe's future career. 

Howe rapidly progressed in his profession and in 1827, in partnership 
with James Spike, purchased the ^yccl:ly Chronicle. The name of this paper 
was changed to the Acadian, and its pages were devoted to work of a literary 
character. It was not a success, and Howe, desiring to enter upon a wider 
field of journalistic activity, disposed of his interest and purchased the Nova 
Scotian. With the establishing of this paper a new era began in the politics 
of the Maritime Provinces. Howe was a fighter by nature and at once, with 
due caution, began to attack the abuses of his time. It is not too much to 
say that he ranks first among the journalists that British North America has 
produced, and his influence, despite the limited audience he appealed to, 
was greater than that of any other Canadian journalist, not even 
excepting George Brown. When he began to conduct the Nova Scotian he 
found a system of afi'airs in his country that no freedom-loving man could 
endure. The people had representative institutions in name only. There 
was a monopoly of office and a ** Family Compact " quite as strong as the one 
that held Upper Canada in its grip. The Governor was sent from England. 
He had an advisory board of twelve members and this little circle of 
aristocrats ruled the Province. Of this the late Mr. George R Fenety 
writes : 

" They were all 'Honorables,* and would have no intercourse with the 
people's representatives, unless to cross them and clog the Royal assent to any 
measure that did not harmonize with their prejudices. If one of them died, 
another was put in his place having the most influence. If the head of a 
department passed away, his office was quickly filled by one of his own kith 
and kin ; and so on in every case. The continuity or tenure was indisputable. 
Those officials were only amenable to themselves and to the Governor ; and 
if the latter proved to be a simple or weak man, as some of them were, he 
was easily brought over to their way of thinking. Thus all the offices in the 
country were in the hands of those twelve irresponsible men, whose individual 



HON. JOSEPH HOWE. 239 

salaries or appurtenances arising from their positions, were large enough to 
maintain their families in regal splendor, of course at the expense of ' the 
people ' who were as much under their sway as the people of Russia now are 
under their Czar. The subordinate clerkships in the various departments 
were dealt with in the same manner — that is all the employees were appointed 
by the irresponsible heads, whether good, bad or indifferent, and nobody 
outside the circle could utter a word of protest. Then the Press was shackled 
or held under the same restraining bondage — not but that there was freedom for 
the expression of independent thought, even to make war upon 'the compact, 
but the publishers knew too well that it was at the risk of losing prestige and 
patronage, or incurring the displeasure or withdrawal of countenance of those 
who were linked in some way with the parties assailed." 

It was against this society that Howe took up his editorial pen. He was 
fearless in his attacks, and although frequently threatened with the law and 
with physical chastisement he continued in his good work. While doing it 
he gained an intimate acquaintance with the people of the Province. He 
was his own business manager, and in the interests of his paper journeyed 
from one end of Nova Scotia to the other. The breezy letters he wrote about 
his travels were only second to Judge Haliburton's delightful sketches of 
Nova Scotian characters. And Judge Haliburton, by the way, was to find 
his first introduction to the public through the pages of the Nova Scotian. 

For the first time in the history of Nova Scotia the freedom of the press 
and the right of the press to express itself on great public questions was 
battled for. Howe attended the meetings of the Legislative Assembly and 
gave a fair and unbiased report of the proceedings ; but his editorial 
comment on the work of the house was eagerly read, as eagerly as were 
George Brown's editorials at the time of the Eepresentation by Population 
agitation. He did more to mould public opinion through the editorial pages 
of the Nova Scotian than did any of the people's representatives from their 
places in the House. His reportorial work in the Legislative Assembly did 
much to educate him for his great career as a reformer. 

He was prosperous now and felt himself in a position to marry, and so in 
1828 he was wedded to a daughter of Captain John McNab. 



240 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

He continued to build up a prosperous newspaper business and over- 
worked himself in the effort, so that in 1832 when seized by a fever his 
constitution was so much run down by his work that his life was despaired 
of, and not a few in the Province were uncharitable enough to hope that he 
might not recover. Recover he did, and continued his battle against the 
Nova Scotia " Family Compact." 

Howe's true career began in 1835. In that year Mr. George Thompson 
published a letter in the Nova Scotian, pointing out the corrupt condition of 
affairs in the municipal government of the city and county of Halifax. 
Although no names were mentioned the officials were accused of corruption 
and Halifax became very much excited. The publisher of the Nova Scotian 
was indicted for libel ; a true bill was found against him, and the Attorney- 
General sent him his notice for trial. Mr. Howe was not in the least alarmed, 
and visited several lawyers to get them to conduct his case but they refused, 
and told him that he should make his peace or submit to fine and 
imprisonment. He thereupon determined to conduct his own case, and 
borrowing books on libel from some of his legal friends shut himself up for 
two weeks before his trial and made a thorough study of libel. 

When the day of his trial came he went before the jury with only the 
first two paragraphs of his speech committed to memory. The court-room 
was crowded. Those on the Bench were against him and a number of the 
jury were related to the magistrates and the judges ; but Howe had a great 
cause, a righteous cause. The freedom of the press was at stake and what he 
might suffer as an individual was sunk in the great cause he was advocating. 
For six hours he addressed the jury with a power never before heard in a^ 
Nova Scotia court-room. For six hours eloquent words fell from his lips, and 
at times the crowd applauded his utterances and at times they were moved to 
tears. The court was adjourned at the close of his speech, but on the 
following morning after the jury had listened to the prejudiced words of the 
Attorney-General and the Chief-Justice they retired, and in the short space of 
ten minutes brought in a verdict of not guilty. It was a magnificent triumph 
and the people rejoiced in it, and a new day broke for Nova Scotia. They 
carried their hero home, shoulder-high ; and he was forced to address them 



HON. JOSEPH HOWE. j^^, 

rt ,rr ":: ""'°" "' '■' '""• ^^^ ^^-^ ""' ^^'^ -"^» ■• ^- ^^^^ - 

too fun for utterance, and leaving the crowd of cheering people before hi, 
house he threw himself on his bed and wept " tears of pride, joy and over- 
wrought emotion-the tears of one who has discovered a new fount of feeling 
and new forces in himself." - 

This great speech made Howe famous. Before this time he was known 
as a bnlhant and clever journalist, but from this moment he was, to the end 
ot ills life, to be looked upon as the ablest mind in Nova Scotia. Some Nova 
SCO aans resident in New York rejoiced to learn of the victory he had gained 
for the Press, and presented him with a silver ewer appropriately engraved in 
memory of the occasion. 

He had been educating the people of Nova Scotia for some years through 
the Pres^ and he now felt called upon to help the Reform forces on the floor 

"' ' , T- "'' '° "'"^" ''" ^^^''""y ^^« <^'«»l™d by proclamation in 
1836 he offered himselt as a candidate for the county of Haliburton, and so 
popular was he that he was elected by a majority of a thousand. His 
position m the Province was very well stated on the banners used in his 
campaign; "Joe Howe, our Patriot and Reformer" was everywhere in 
evidence throughout his constituency. He was now in the vigor of his young 
manhood. But thirty-two years old at the time of his election, he had th! 
strength and youthful enthusiasm which was in the end to bring about the 
reforms that seemed impossible when he began his career. 

At this same time a straggle was taking place in Upper Canada. 
Patnot. and "Loyalists" were at daggers drawn. The "Family 
Compact had the Province by the throat, and to many of the people the 
winnmg of hberty by constitutional means seemed impossible. The struggle 
was to end in bloodshed ; swords were to be drawn, and much property fnd 
many noble hves were to be lost. Joe Howe did all that the Reformers of 
Upper Canada did and more, and he did all by constitutional means. Had 
there been a strong, sane man in Upper Canada in 183C to educate the 
people through the Press and on the floors of the Assembly, the "Patriots- 
war might have been averted. Doubtless if William Lyon Mackenzie had 



242 BUILDERS OF CAjSTADA. 

been in Nova Scotia rebellion would have broken out, for a large section of 
the people throughout the country felt strongly against the domineering 
attitude of their constitutional rulers. 

As soon as the Assembly met in 1837 Howe became the recognized 
leader of the Reformers. The old Council of Twelve sitting with closed 
doors, answerable, practically to no one, for their actions, at once became a 
subject for attack. Mr. Doyle moved a series of resolutions in opposition to 
the doors of the Legislative Council being kept closed to the public, but these 
resolutions were treated with scorn by the Council, and even some of the 
more moderate of the Liberal leaders were not prepared to stand by Howe 
and his followers. They deserted the Radical wing and Howe formed the 
advanced Liberal party which was to work out the reforms he had at 
heart. 

To Doyle's resolutions the Council replied : " That His Majesty's 
Government denied the right of the House to comment upon its mode of 
procedure. Whether their deliberations were open or secret was their 
concern and theirs only." The battle continued and finally right prevailed, 
and the doors of the Council were forced open. 

When Howe entered the Assembly members were elected for a term of 
seven years, but a bill was now introduced to make the term four years. On the 
occasion of the debate on this bill Howe proved himself a brilliant and witty 
speaker. He was attacked by one of the ablest parliamentarians of his time, 
a man experienced in chastising opponents, and so bitter was his address 
that Howe's friends pitied him ; but Howe, after dealing with the serious 
question before the country, turned on his antagonist and held him up to 
such ridicule that ever after his opponents attacked him with fear and 
trembling. 

But his great work during this first session was a series of twelve 
resolutions he introduced on behalf of reform. One of these resolutions 
admirably gives the demands of the reformers and the state of the 
government at this time in Nova Scotia, and is here quoted in full : 

Resolved "That while the House had a due reverence for British 
institutions, and a desire to preserve to themselves and their children the 



HON. JOSEPH HOWE. 243 

advantages of that constitution, under which their brethren on the other side 
of the Atlantic have enjoyed so much prosperity and happiness, they cannot 
but feel that those they represent participate but slightly in these blessings. 
They know that the spirit of that Constitution — the genius of those 
institutions — is complete responsibility to the people, by whose resources and 
for whose benefit they are maintained. But sad experience has taught them 
that, in this, colony, the people and their representatives are pof^'erless, 
exercising upon the local government very little influence, and possessing 
no effectual control. In England, the people by one vote of their 
representatives, can change the Ministry, and alter any course of policy 
injurious to their interests ; here the Ministry are His Majesty's Council, 
combining legislative, judicial and executive powers, holding their seats for 
life, and treating with contempt or indifference the wishes of the people, and 
the representations of the Commons. In England, the representative branch 
can compel a redress of grievances by withholding the supplies ; here they 
have no such remedy, because the salaries of nearly all the public men being 
provided for by permanent laws, or paid out of the casual and territorial 
revenues, or from the produce of duties collected under Imperial Acts, a 
stoppage of supplies, while it inflicted great injury upon the country by 
leaving the roads, bridges and other essential services unprovided for, would 
not touch the emoluments of the heads of departments in the Council, or of 
any but a few of the subordinate officers of the government." 

These resolutions roused the friends of the Council and man after man 
arose to level his sharpest thrusts at Howe. For ten days this debate 
continued and for ten days strong and bitter speeches were heard in the House 
of Assembly. But Howe was calm through it all and carefully noted down 
in shorthand — and he was an expert stenographer — ^the main points in his 
opponents' speeches, and when they had finished rose amid an ominous silence 
and began an address which lasted for eight hours. It was a brilliant piece 
of work worthy to be studied alongside the best speeches delivered in Congress 
or in the British House of Commons. He proved himself once more a master of 
rhetoric, and by apt illustration, by biting sarcasm, by flashes of wit, held the 
crowded house spell-bound during the entire speech. The opening was a 



244 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

happy one and will serve to illustrate Howe's manner of debate, and shows 
at once his power as an orator and a self-confidence which, when badced by 
knowledge, goes far to give power. 

" There is a good story told of an Irishman," he said, " who was put in 
the pillory for saying that the city authorities were no better than they should 
be. He bore the affliction with exemplary patience, and severe enough it 
was ; for every silly fellow who expected au invitation to the Mayor's feast — 
every servile creature, who aspired to a civic office, strove to win favor by 
pelting him with conspicuous activity. When the hour had expired, and a 
goodly array of missiles had accumulated upon the stage, the culprit, taking 
off his hat and bowing politely to the crowd, said : * Now, gentlemen, it is my 
turn,* and commencing with his Worship, pelted the crowd with great 
dexterity and effect. The Irish, who always relish humor, were so pleased 
with the joke that they carried the man home on their shoulders. I have no 
expectation that my fate will be so triumphant, but no gentleman will 
question my right to follow the example. I have sat for ten days in this 
political pillory ; missiles of every calibre have hurtled about my head ; they 
have accumulated in great abundance, and if my turn has come, those by 
whom they were showered have no right to complain. As first in dignity, if 
not in accuracy of aim, perhaps I ought to commence with the learned and 
honorable crown officers ; but there is an old Warwickshire tradition, that 
Guy, before he grappled with the dun cow, tried his hand upon her calves ; 
and perhaps it would be as well, before touching the learned Attorney- 
General, that I should dispose of the strange progeny his political system has 
warmed into existftnce. The eagle, before he lifts his eye to the meridian, 
leariis to gaze with steadiness on the lesser lights by which he is surrounded ; 
and "as Jove's satellites are less than Jove," so are the learned leader's 
disciples inferior to their master." 

Howe's own words are infinitely superior to anything that can be said in 
praise of them, and several short passages in this same speech admirably 
illustrate his transcendent powers as a debater. Of one of his opponents he 
said : " To my honorable friend's manliness and courtesy I am willing to bear 
testimony ; but his reverence for th*» past makes him a yery poor judge or 



HON. JOSEPH HOWB. J47 

expounder of the new principles ; like " Old Mortality " he delights in 
haunting ancient places and refreshing broken tombstones ; while the stream 
of life goes by and flowers bloom unheeded at his feet." Of another he said : 
♦' My honorable friend found fault with me for my reference to David, and 
told me that that great and good man ' raised not his hand against the Lord's 
anointed.' Neither have I. I have not killed Lord Falkland, but I have 
shown him, as David did Saul, the folly and negligence of his advisers. 
When the drowsy guards left the master they should have protected, at his 
mercy, in the cave of Engedi, David cut off the skirt of his garment, to show 
the imbecility of the statesmen and warriors by whom he was surrounded." 

It was this powerful use of language, this consummate art as a speaker, 
coupled with the conviction that he was right, that made Howe the idol of 
the people of Nova Scotia and that brought about the reforms he advocated. 

However, he could not speak as he did without making bitter enemies, 
so bitter that some of them even sought his life. As a result of the speech on 
the twelve resolutions he was challenged to a duel by the son of the Chief 
Justice, John Haliburton. To decline the duel would have been to stamp 
him with cowardice. He met his opponent in the early morning hours, 
permitted Haliburton to shoot first and then deliberately discharged his 
pistol in the air. As Principal Grant says : " he had no desire to have 
murder upon his soul," and as he was a dead shot it would have gone hard 
with Haliburton had he taken advantage of the situation. This did not 
satisfy the Tories, however, and one Sir Robert D'George Hkewise 
challenged him to mortal combat. However, he wisely declined the challenge, 
saying " that he was not prepared to make himself a target for everyone to 
shoot at who maintained he had a grievance," and added " that his country 
at that time could not afford to dispense with his services." 

The resolutions introduced by Howe and duly passed by the Assembly 
roused the anger of the council, and they refused to vote supplies unless the 
obnoxious resolutions were withdrawn. Howe was as diplomatic as he wa« 
resolute, and promptly moved that the resolutions be rescinded ; and tha 



248 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

appeased Council passed the Supply Bill. Howe then embodied the 
substance of the resolutions in an address to the Crown, and the address was 
adopted during the closing hours of the session. 

Howe went further than this. He addressed a series of letters to Lord 
John Russell, Secretary for the Colonies, pointing out the state of affairs in 
Nova Scotia and the need of responsible government to keep the colonies 
loyal to the motherland. In these letters he deplored the rebellious outbreaks 
in Canada. His strong presentation of the case, coupled with the report oi 
Lord Durham, did much to make the Home government take a liberal view 
of the situation. Instructions were sent to Sir Colin Campbell, Governor of 
Nova Scotia, to, as far as possible, meet the wishes of the people ; but Sir 
Colin Campbell was opposed to responsible government for Nova Scotia, and 
put forth no efforts to carry out the suggestions of Lord John Russell. Howe 
thereupon moved an address to Her Majesty in which the grievances of the 
Province were set forth at length, and in which the recall of Sir Colin 
Campbell was demanded. Lord Falkland was sent out to replace him and at 
once made a feeble endeavor to satisfy those who claimed that they had 
grievances. 

He dismissed four of the members of the Executive Council and invited 
four Liberals to accept the vacant seats. They did so, but the Tory and 
Reform elements in the Council continued to act in such bitter antagonism to 
each other that no progress in reform was made. Howe and his friends in 
the end resigned. Lord Falkland sided with the old Tory element, and at 
the time of the elections visited different parts of the Province with the hope 
of defeating Howe. But Howe followed in his steps, scathingly denounced 
his mode of conducting the government and won a magnificent victory, 
carrying the Province by a large majority. A vote of want of confidence in 
the government was passed and the Tory executive resigned. In 1848 Nova 
Scotia was in the hands of the Liberals. Lord Falkland felt his position 
keenly and left the province in anger and humiliation. 

The fight had lasted for ten years and during that time Howe never let 
up in the struggle. The strain had been a great one ; he had overworked 



HOK. JOSEPH HOWK. 249 

mind and body, but in the end he had his reward. During the last two 
years of the struggle he was forced to reside in the country, and among the 
Musquodoboit farmers he, to use his own words, " worked his body and rested 
his mind, learning to plow, to mow, to reap, to cradle." During these yeara 
he won ihe lasting friendship of the farmers of the Musquodoboit district 
Joseph Howe worked not only for the liberties of Nova Scotians, but for 
the material prosperity of the Province as well. In 1838 he made his first 
visit to Europe. On this trip the man-of-war on which he was a passenger 
met the steamer "Cyrius" off the coast of Ireland. Howe's quick mind at 
once conceived the scheme of having a line of such steamers ply between 
England and Halifax, linkmg the colony more closely to the motherland 
He did not permit this to be merely a passing thought, but, when in 
London, succeeded in having the Colonial Secretary interested in steamship 
commumcation between England and America. As a result of Howe's work 
Mr. Cunard, a merchant of Halifax, took hold of the scheme and the 
celebrated Cunard Line had its beginning. 

Howe saw the possibilities of the development of his Province by the 
establishment of railway communication with the other Provinces of British 
North America, and, immediately after his great victory for responsible 
government was won, began the advocacy of vast railway enterprises He 
had subhme confidence in the future of Canada, and in the early fifties 
declared : " That in a few yeai^ we shall make the journey hence to Quebec 
and Montreal, and home through Portland and St. John by rail and I 
beheve that many in this room will live to hear the whistle of the 'steam- 
engine m the passes of the Eocky Mountains, and to make the journey from 
Hahfax to the Pacific Ocean in five or six days." In his railway schemes he 
looked for help to England, but the Home government declined any 
assistance. Joe Howe was not to be beaten, but went to England and 
succeeded in changing the Colonial policy of the government of Great 
Britain, and secared from the government a pledge of a loan of £7,000 000 
sterHng at a low rato of interest for the construction of the Intercolonial 
Railway. His suavity of manner and his eloquence made a deep impression 
on those with whom he came in contact in Great Britain. He was to risit 



250 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

England again in the sixties, and while there delivered several speeches that 
delighted men accustomed to the oratory of a Gladstone, and did much to 
make Canada known in the homeland. 

He early saw that for the true development of British North America 
tlie Provinces should be united, and his railway schemes pointed that way ; 
but in 1861 he introduced resolutions proposing consultation between the 
Provinces on the subject of Confederation. The Colonial Secretary approved 
of the idea, but nothing came of it. However, notwithstanding Joe Howe's 
later attitude, he must ever be looked upon as one of the Fathers of 
Confederation. He was one of the first to propose a conference on the 
subject, and his eloquent words on a United Canada and a United Empire 
did much to educate those who were afterwards to work out the scheme of 
Confederation. 

It was not to be plain sailing with him. Dr. Tupper, who had beaten 
him in 1855 in Cumberland County, led the Conservative forces in the 
Province with great astuteness, and in 1863 succeeded in winning forty out of 
fifty-five seats, and Howe handed over to him the keys of the Provincial 
Secretary's office. 

The Charlottetown and Quebec Confederation conferences now took place, 
and Howe, who was absent on his duties as Fisheries Commissioner, was 
unable to attend them. It is difficult now to judge the man but posterity 
blames him for his violent opposition to Confederation. He may have been 
prompted by jealousy, and he may have taken his stand believing that his 
Province was being coerced into the union. He fought with his usual vigor 
and went to England and there " wrought as if he would move heaven and 
earth" against Confederation. But he was informed that the Act of 
Confederation would come into effect immediately, and he was requested 
to show no more pposition. 

Right or wrong. Nova Scotia stood by him, and in the elections that 
followed his return from England, only one Confederation member, Dr. 
Tupper, was returned for the Dominion, and in the Provincial election out of 
thirty-eight all but two constituencies elected anti-confederationists. The 



HOW. JOSEPH HOWB. 251 

people of Nova Scotia believed with Howe that the Province was being 
"coerced" into the union, and so great an authority as Mr. (Sir) Wilfrid 
Laurier has said " that it was an act of 'brute force.' " 

That Howe was in no way disloyal to his country is shown in the 
magnificent speech he delivered in Detroit, July, 1865, at the great 
International Commercial Convention that was held in that city — a speech 
breathing loyalty and enthusiasm for his country in every sentence. 

Had Howe's career ended with his opposition to Confederation the 
historians of his life might have had nothing but praise for him. But out of 
politics he could not keep, and he saw a wider field for his genius in the 
Dominion House, and so on the plea of securing better terms for the Province 
made overtures to the new Dominion government. Sir John Macdonald 
gladly welcomed to his forces a man who had so lately shown that he held a 
whole Province in the hollow of his hand, and Howe was given a seat in the 
Cabinet as Secretary of State. The cry at once went up that he had sold 
himself and his Province, and his old friends shunned him, and "young 
friends who once would have felt honored by a word, walked as close before 
or behind him as possible that he might hear their insults." He stood for 
the county of Hants, and after a hard struggle in the dead of winter, won by 
a small majority. 

As the Secretary of State had charge of Indian afiairs he was soon to be 
tested. The North- West Rebellion of 1870 broke out and Howe proved 
himself a statesman of breadth and generosity, and hope for the future. But 
he was never in the Dominion House the Joe Howe that led the Reform 
forces in the Nova Scotian House of Assembly. He was, to quote the words 
of an admirer and friend, " like a majestic oak in the midst of a forest 
denuded of its foliage by the lightning's blast — or a Sampson after having 
been shorn of his locks by a Delilah." 

His constitution had been shattered by the long years of arduous toil for 
Nova Scotia, and friends and foes alike saw that he had not long to live. Id 
1873 the Grovernment of Sir John Macdonald generously made him 
Lieutenant-Governor of the Province he had freed from bondage ; but he was 
not long to enjoy the honor, for in a few weeks he died^ and in the striking 



252 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

language of Principal Grant, " the only lev6e he held in Government House 
was after his death when he lay in state and thousands crowded around to 
take a last look at their dead idol." 

He was universally mourned. Genial, eloquent, sympathetic, Joe Howe 
had still the hearts of the people. In many humble homes in every part of 
the Province tears of genuine grief were shed whtiii it was learned that 
tlie champion of the |)eopl©'s rights was no more. 



CHAPTER XY. 

HON. WILLIAM HAMILTON MERRITT. 

William Hamilton Merritt, a Prominent United Empire Loyalist — His Father One of Simcoe's 
Queen's Rangers — His Mother a Native of South Carolina — His Father Attracted to Upper 
Canada by the Offers Held Out to Settlers by Governor Simcoe — ^The Family Settle in the 
Niagara District — William Hamilton Merritt's Early Education — A Long Journey to the 
East and to the Bermudas — Begins His Business Life — His Experiences in the War of 1812 
— His Marriage — Recommences a Business Career — Surveys the Route for the Welland 
Canal — The Undertaking Delayed — The Work on the Canal Commenced — For Five Years 
Occupied in Constructing and Financing the Welland Canal — The Canal Opened — 
Projects the Niagara Falls Suspension Bridge — Promotes Welland Railway Company — 
Mr. Merritt's Public Career — ^His Death While Passing Through the Canal at Cornwall. 

AMONG the many sons of the United Empire Loyalists whose names 
stand out prominently on the pages of Canadian history as the makers 
of the great Dominion, none is more worthy of study than William 
Hamilton Merritt. His ancestors had fought valorously in the English wars, 
and one of them, his maternal great grandfather, had been present in some 
of the fights that finally wrested Canada from the French, so that William 
Hamilton Merritt's life may be said to have been associated with the history 
of British North America from its earliest days. 

His father, Thomas Merritt, although a farmer's son, was a man oi 
considerable culture and refinement, and had spent several years at Harvard 
College studying medicine. The War of the Revolution broke out, and he 
could not remain neutral. Simcoe's Queen's Rangers were, at that time, 
attracting a good deal of attention among the Loyalist population of the 
Colonies and many sought to be admitted to their ranks. Merritt was one oi 
the first volunteers, and joined this celebrated corps as a coronet. As haa 
been pointed out in the sketch of Governor Simcoe, the Rangers operated 
over a wide district. While they were in South Carolina Thomas Merriti 
met Miss Mary Hamilton, and, although on active service, was married tc 
253 



254 BUILDERS OF CANADA, 

her in 1779. After the regiment returned north and disbanded the young 
couple resided for a time in New York city, but the Loyalist soldier, finding 
the social atmosphere uncongenial, moved, along with many other Loyalists, 
to St. John, New Brunswick. Their residence here was but a brief one, and 
they shortly after moved to South Carolina, and from there to the old Merritt 
homestead in Westchester County, New York State. It was at this place, 
on July 3, 1793, that William Hamilton Merritt was born. 

When Governor Simcoe began his rule in Upper Canada he put forth 
every effort to attract United Empire Loyalists to the Province. He was 
particularly anxious to have as many as possible of his old Rangers about 
him. Thomas Merritt learned of the offers he was holding out to settlers, 
and courageously took the long and difficult journey to Niagara district to 
see the land for himself. He was much impressed with the character of the 
inhabitants already settled in the country, and with the richness of the soil, 
and he determined to move there with his family; and in 1796 he journeyed 
to the Niagara peninsula and settled down in the forest primeval near what 
is now St. Catharines. 

The e&rly life of the subject of this sketch was a laborious one. The 
hewing out of a home in the forest of Upper Canada was by no means an 
easy task, and all had to labor with their hands. Young Merritt did much 
to assist his parents in building up a home in their adopted country. 
However, his father was not unmindful of his education and kept him 
constantly at school. He received the rudiments of learning at a log school 
at the " Corners," and when he was twelve years old he was sent to Port 
Burlington (now Hamilton) to attend the school of a Mr. Cockerelh Here he 
devoted most of his time to mathematics and field surveying, and, no doubt, 
it was here that he received the bent of mind that led him to consider the 
great engineering undertakings that he was afterwards to promote. Mr. 
Cockerell moved to Niagara and Youna; Merritt went with him, and had now 
the additional advantage of receiving instruction from the Rev. John Burns, 
a clergyman of sound classical scholarship. 




MAISONEUVE MONUMENT, MONTREAL 



BlON. WILLIAM HAMILTON MEKRITT. 257 

When fifteen years old he set out on a journey that was to do not a little 
towards shaping his character. A sea-faring uncle was at Quebec, and he 
journeyed to that far city to join his ship and go with him to the Bermudas. 
It was his first insight into the vastness and beauty of Canada, and his 
boyish imagination was charmed with the grandeur of the Great Lakes, the 
exquisite beauty of the Thousand Islands and the exciting novelty of the 
rapids of the; St. Lawrence. Montreal, the busy commercial centre ofn 
Canada, impressed him greatly, but what delighted him most was the 
majestic grandeur of the scene from the Heights of Quebec, the quaintness of 
the narrow streets under the citadel and the points of historic interest in that 
battle-scarred city. 

From Quebec he journeyed down the St. Lawrence, crossed the Gulf, sailed 
through the Straits of Northumberland and into the picturesque and strongly 
fortified harbour of Halifax. From Halifax he sailed to the Island of St. 
George in the Bermudas. He had a stormy passage and was not greatly 
impressed with sea life, and never seems to have had any desire to take it up 
as a profession. His uncle sold his vessel, and he returned to his home, 
visiting New York and St. .John, New Brunswick, on his way back. For 
some months he remained in St. John attending a very excellent school in 
that thriving town. 

When he reached his home in Upper Canada he felt that it was time to 
begin life in earnest, and through the assistance of his father entered into a 
partnership in a general store. But his father was appointed sherifi^ of the 
district, and so much of his time was taken up with his official duties that his 
farm was being neglected and so his son disposed of his share in his business 
and undertook the management of his father's farm. He began his new life 
on a somewhat ambitious scale, and was thoroughly enjoying his work when 
the war that had been threatening for some years broke out between the United 
States and the Motherland. War had no terrors for him, and he decided to 
do what he could to repel the army that was threatening to invade Canada. 
From his earliest days he had been a fine horseman, and shortly before wai 



258 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

was declared had been given a lieutenant's commission in the militia. He 
at once got into the saddle, and until the battle of Lundy's Lane was one of 
the most distinguished cavalry leaders in Canada. 

It was during the first year of the war, while he was patrolling the 
banks of the Niagara River, that the canal scheme, which was to be the 
great undertaking of his life, took shape in his brain. He was at the battle 
of Queenston Heights and did gallant work after the death of his commander, 
Brock, He had on several occasions been given important tasks to perform 
by Brock, and he now felt the loss of that distinguished leader keenly. He 
fought at the battle of Stoney Creek, was sent on several occasions to 
the east for reinforcements, and in the heroic struggle at Lundy's Lane was 
taken prisoner with a number of other officers. He was held prisoner for 
eight months, and spoke highly of the treatment he received at the hands of 
the Americans. It was not until March, 1815, that he was able to return to 
Canada, 

Meanwhile his imprisonment could not have been altogether unpleasant, 
for, during his captivity, he met Miss Catharine Prendergast, the daughter of 
one Dr. Prendergast, a member of the New York Legislature, and on March 
13, 1815, in his twenty-second year, was married. 

When he returned to Upper Canada he entered energetically upon a 
business career. He seems to have reached out in many directions, and his 
labors are typical of the business enterprise of the time. He had a potashery, 
a saw-mill, a grist-mill and a distillery, and likewise devoted considerable 
of his time to the manufacture of salt, a very precious commodity at that 
time in the western wilderness. In the interests of his business he made 
several journeys to Kingston and Montreal and was held in high repute by 
those with whom he had dealings. 

Shortly after beginning his business career the idea of connecting Lake 
Erie and Lake Ontario by means of a canal, which first entered his mind 
when, as a dashing cavalryman, he patrolled that district, now took more 
definite shape, and he made a rough survey of the region and believed that a 
canal could be constructed. He petitioned the government for a scientific 



HON. WILLIAM HAMILTON MERRITT. 259 

survey, and two thousand pounds were granted for the same. But the 
survey made was an unwise one, and the canal project was set back for five 
years. 

On account of the destruction caused in Upper Canada by the War of 
1812 the country was in a greatly depressed condition and business was 
carried on under such great difficulties that there were many failures. 
William Hamilton Merritt was among the sufferers and the business reverses 
that he sustained, in the early years of his mercantile career, were enough to 
crush a less energetic spirit, but he bore up manfully. His friends stood by 
him and the business men in Montreal, with whom he had dealings, had 
perfect confidence in him. In the end he was to come out all right, and, no 
doubt, the heroic struggle he made strengthened him for the vaster 
enterprises that he was, later in life, to bring to a successful conclusion. 

Although the canal project was set back by the survey that was made in 
1818, Mr. Merritt continued to talk up the scheme, and in 1823 succeeded in 
having a new survey made. In January of the following year the Welland 
Canal Company was incorporated, and for some years after this great project 
of uniting the two lakes was to receive his almost undivided attention. As 
soon as the company was incorporated he set forth for the purpose of 
procuring stock. He visited Kingston, Montreal and Quebec and found 
many sympathizers in his new work, and a few who were willing to give 
financial assistance. He visited Lord Dalhousie, and so impressed upon him 
the possibilities for the development of the great West that this canal would 
open up that Lord Dalhousie became almost as enthusiastic as himself and 
promised to lay the scheme before the home authorities. The work was one 
which, he conceived, would be of almost as great interest to the United States 
as to Canada, and succeeded in securing financial aid there. It is worthy of 
note that had it not been for the help he received from his New York friends 
at this time his great canal scheme would probably have been delayed for 
some years. On his return from New York he visited De Witt Clinton, the 
originator of the Erie Canal, and endeavored to interest him in the 
project. 



260 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

He was eminently successfal and the directors felt that they could no¥P 
begin their great engineering work ; and so, on November 30, 1824, in the 
presence of some two hundred persons, the first sod was turned near the 
head of one of the branches of the " Twelve." 

For the next five years William Hamilton Merritt was fully occupied 
with the construction of the canal. There were many who were only too glad 
to prophecy failure for the enterprise and the directors had to contend with 
local jealousy and a lack of national enthusiasm. However, the work went 
steadily on, and Mr. Merritt was able to inspire many with some of his own 
enthusiasm. As the work progressed it was found that more money would 
be required than was at first anticipated. The directors had exhausted the 
funds their Canadian and American friends were willing to risk in the 
enterprise, and so there was nothing left for it but to raise capital to complete 
the enterprise in England. Naturally Mr. Merritt was sent to the homeland 
to obtain funds. He had an interesting visit and was consulted by the Select 
Committee on the Civil Government of Canada with regard to the Clergy 
Reserves and other important matters. His replies to their questions show 
how deep and broad an interest he took in the political and social life of his 
country. He met with a considerable measure of success, and on his return 
to Canada work on the canal was prosecuted with renewed energy. 

In the autumn of 1829 everything was ready to open the canal. 
Unlooked for circumstances arose, however, and it was decided not to have 
the public opening until 1830, but the real opening took place on November 
27, 1829, when the schooner " R. H. Boughton," Captain Pkeatt, and the 
schooner "Annie and Jane," Captain J. Voller, passed through the canal 
from Lake Ontario to Lake Erie and anchored in Buflfalo on December 2. 
On their progress through the Welland Canal enthusiastic crowds had lined 
the banks, and when they reached Buffalo they were received with a 
salute. 

The canal became government property in 1842, and a part of the great 
system of canals that was ultimately to connect Lake Superior with the 
Atlantic, and to William Hamilton Merritt is due the credit of being the first 
promoter of thip v«ist engineering enterprise. 



HON. WILLIAM HAMILTON MEKRITT. 261 

The building of the Welland Canal was not the only great enterprise he 
initiated. It was he who projected the Niagara Falls Suspension Bridge in 
1845, and he was president of the company which built it until his death. 
Welland Railway Company, too, was promoted by him ; indeed, he reached 
out in every direction possible for the true development of Canada, and in his 
undertakings the element of selfishness was never in evidence. 

Naturally Mr. Merritt could not keep out of public life and was returned 
to Parliament for the county of Haldimand in 1832. Ho was a prominent 
figure during the bitter years of the rebellion and naturally opposed William 
Lyon Mackenzie, but h© was likewise generous enough to sign the petition to 
Sir George Arthur, Lieutenant-Governor of the Province of Upper Canada, 
for the reprieve of Lount and Matthews, who had been sentenced to be 
hanged. It was he who brought this petition to Toronto and presented it to 
the Governor, but unhappily it was of no avail. He rejoiced when the Union 
took place, and had much to do with drawing Upper and Lower Canada 
closer together. In 1848 he was mad© President of the Council, and in 1850 
he became Commissioner of Public Works. In 1851 he retired from 
Parliament, and did not return to public life until 1860 when he was 
elected by acclamation to the Legislative Council for AUanburg. 

He had now not long to live. The closing years of his life were 
clouded with great sorrows. The death of his son William in 1860 and the 
death of his wife on the 10th of January, 1862, caused him such deep grief 
that his strength failed him and his friends saw that his death was not far 
off. He journeyed seaward with the hope that the sea breezes might restore 
him some of his old-time vigor, but when he reached Montreal he was in 
such poor health that the doctors gave him no hope of recovery ; and in July 
he set out upon his return journey to St. Catharines, hoping to dia among 
his own people in the district he had done so much to build up. 

As the steamer "Champion," in which he was journeying westward, 
was passing through the canal at Cornwall the angel of death visited him. 
It was not an unfitting place in which to end his life ; indeed, it was 

peculiarly appropriate, that one who had done so much to overcome the 

15 



262 BUILDERS OP CANADA. 

obstacles to the successful navigation of the noble St. Lawrence should be 
gathered to his fathers on those calm waters and in sight of the turbulent 
rapids of the Long Sault. 

William Hamilton Merritt was a Canadian with lofty ideals and lofty 
hopes for the future of his country and did much to foster that spirit oi 
enterprise that has in the end given us a united Canada, and opened up the 
country from the Atlantic to the Pacific. 



CHAPTER XYI. 

BISHOP STEACHAN. 

The Pioneer In Educational Matters in Upper Canada — Of Humble Scotck Parentage — Begins 

His Life Work as a Tutor — A Graduate of the University of Aberdeen — A Scbool-Teacher 
in Scotland — Offered a Situation in Canada — His Disappointment on Reaching the New 
"World — Teaches in Kingston — Takes Orders in the Church of England — Appointed to 
Cornwall — The Celebrated Cornwall School Established by Him — His Ideals as a Teacher 
— Appointed Rector at York — Does Excellent Work during the War of 1812 — On Death 
of Honorable Richard Cartwright Appointed a Member of the Executive Council of Upper 
Canada — Vehemently Denounces Mr. Robert Gourlay — Appointed a Member of the 
Legislative Council — Pays a Visit to the Motherland — The Church of St. James Burned — 
The Building of the Cathedral of St, James — Mr. Poulett Thomson and the Clergy 
Reserves Question — Corner-Stone of King's College Laid — The Bishop of Toronto's 
Work in Connection with His Diocese — University of Toronto Takes the Place of King's 
College— Trinity College Opened— The Closing Years of Bishop Strackaa's Life. 

JOHN STRACHAN, Bishop of Toronto, was one of the first men to 
direct the attention ©f the people of Upper Canada to educational 
matters. He was of Scotch descent, having been born in Aberdeen, 
April 12, 1778. His father was an overseer in a stone-quarry and was 
nominally a Presbyterian, but it is said that he had a strong liking for the 
Episcopal service, and that his son frequently visited an Episcopal chapel 
with him. 

"When John Strachan was only fourteen years old his father met with an 
accident in the quarry which caused his death. His family were left in poor 
circumstances, and John had to look about him to find something to do to 
assist his mother and sisters to earn their livelihood. He secured work as a 
tutor and by rigid economy was enabled to enter the University of Aberdeen 
in 1794. The long vacation of the Scotch University gave him much time 
to himself and during these months he industriously taught. He had a 
successful college career and graduated a Master of Arts. 

263 



264 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

On graduating he obtained a school near St. Andrews with a salary of 
£30 a year, but he managed to save even out of this small income. He was 
a born teacher and early acquired a good reputation. A vacancy occurred in 
Kettle; he applied for the position and was accepted. At Kettle he 
received £50 a year. 

About this time Upper Canada was attracting a good deal of attention in 
the Old World. A teacher was needed for that far distant province and Mr. 
Strachan, who was now in his twenty-first year was offered the position. He 
did not like the thought of leaving Scotland and his friends there, but the 
temptation of a free passage to the New World, board and lodging, and £80 
a year induced him to leave his fatherland. 

He sailed late in the year for Canada, and did not reach Kingston until 
the last day of December. Here he found that the situation had been 
misrepresented to him, and so disgusted with the outlook was he that he was 
anxious to return to Scotland at once ; but he had not the price of a passage 
home. Richard Cartwright was then one of the leading men in Upper 
Canada. He was attracted by the sturdy and scholarly young Scot and took 
him into his own house, giving him tutorial work to do. 

For three years John Strachan resided in Kington and was, during that 
time, a most successful teacher ; but he saw no future for him in the teaching 
profession and so he decided to take Orders in the Church of England. He 
was ordained on May 22, 1803, and was appointed to Cornwall. 

Although he was now a preacher of the Gospel he found it impossible to 
shake off his love of teaching, and as soon as he was established at Cornwall 
renewed his work as a teacher and established the celebrated Cornwall School. 
Among his pupils were a number of lads who were to rise to the first place in 
the affairs of this country. As a teacher he had strikingly original methods. 
His boys were thoroughly drilled, but at the same time he was no 
pedant. He had the very loftiest conception of education, and in an address 
which he delivered four years after establishing his school at Cornwall, 
pointed out what he believed to be the true purpose of education. 



BISHOP STKACHAN. 267 

" Be careful, my young friends," he said, " in the prosecution of your 
professional studies, to improve the advantages which you have here acquired. 
Be patient, diligent, and methodical, and you will make rapid and profitable 
progress. It is to the want of a systematic education, to a confused method 
of thinking, early acquired but never thoroughly removed, that we must 
attribute those numerous inconsistencies and that confusion of ideas, which 
we find ^0 general among those we converse with. The opinions of persons of 
credit are frequently taken up by men without examination, or deduced 
from principles in themselves erroneous, because they have never given 
themselves the trouble of sifting them to the bottom. How contemptible 
rash opinions, unsupported by solid reasons, must appear to an accurate 
thinker, though delivered with fluency, or even elegance of language, it is 
easy to imagine. By encouraging you to think accurately, and to exercise 
industry and application, we have endeavored to protect you from this rock, 
and to give solidity to all your future acquisitions. It is only the man who 
is not afraid to decide for himself, that can discharge any office he may hold, 
with probity and honor." 

And again in closing : " Cultivate then, my young friends, all thes« 
virtues which dignify the human character, and mark in your behaviour the 
respect you entertain for everything venerable and holy. It is this conduct 
that will raise you above the rivalship, the intrigues, and slanders by which 
you will be surrounded. They will exalt you above this little spot of earth, 
so full of malice, contention and disorder ; and extend your views, with joy 
and expectation, to that better country which is beyond the grave." 

It was in the year when he gave this sage advice to his pupils that he 
was married to a well-to-do widow, the daughter of Dr. Wood, a physician of 
Cornwall. He continued for some years longer to labor industriously both as 
a teacher and a preacher. His sermons were powerful efforts ; and, due to 
his robust Scotch constitution, he was able to accomplish the work of three 
men. His ability and usefulness in the New "World were to receive 
recognition from his old university, and in 1811 he was honored with the 
degree of Doctor of Divinity. 



268 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

About this time the whole course of his life was to be changed. The 
death of Dr. Stuart necessitated his removal to the capital of the Province, 
where he was to labor for over fifty years. He seems ever to have been most 
careful about financial matters, and was loath to leave Cornwall where he was 
prospering. York was, at that time, a village of little more than three 
hundred inhabitants, and at first he would not accept the call ; but when 
Major-General Sir Isaac Brock offered him the chaplaincy of the troops, 
thus adding £150 to his income, he promptly accepted. 

He journeyed to York at a critical time in the history of the country. 
The War of 1812 was just beginning, and as he and his family voyaged 
westward in a batteau they were constantly on the look-out for American 
soldiers. From Kingston they sailed by schooner to York. When Dr. 
Strachan reached his destination he was to prove a force in the little town. 
There was much suffering, and due to his instrumentality " The Loyal and 
Patriotic Society of Upper Canada," which was to do so much to succour 
the afflicted, was formed. At length York capitulated and Dr. Strachan 
was of great - service in caring for the sick and wounded and in saving 
property. It is said that, on one occasion, his life was threatened by an 
American soldier. 

In the following year his old friend, Hon. Richard Cartwright, died, and 
so highly were his services appreciated that he was appointed a member of 
the Executive Council of Upper Canada. When the Hon. James McGill 
died he bequeathed £10,000 and a site for a University for the students 
of Montreal. Dr. Strachan was appointed a trustee. Mr. McGill, indeed, 
had intended that he should be the first principal. 

When Mr. Robert Gourlay came to Canada in 1818 Dr. Strachan looked 
upon him as a black-sheep who had entered his well-regulated Tory fold, and 
he vehemently denounced the Scotch Radical. No doubt Gourlay was 
something of a fire-brand, but to him is due the credit for having initiated 
the Reform movement in Canada which was to culminate in Lord Durham's 
report. 



BISHOP STRACHAN. 269 

For several years Dr. Strachan had been chaplain of the Legislative 
Council, but in 1820 he was appointed a member of the Legislative Council, 
and before he could take his seat had to resign the oflSce of chaplain. He 
did this with some reluctance, as it meant financial loss to him. 

He had now been in Canada for twenty-five years, and had become 
strongly identified with the life of the Province. He determined, however, 
to take a short rest, and in 1824 set out on a voyage to his native land. He 
was not to have a complete holiday, as he was deputed by the Lieutenant- 
Governor and his advisers to furnish the Home government with information 
relating to Upper Canada. He frequently met the Secretary of State for the 
Colonies and the Under Secretary, and did good work for both Church and 
Province. 

Education was still in a very backward condition in Upper Canada, and 
on his return from England he put forth strenuous efforts to improve affairs 
• in this respect. As a result an Act was passed for the establishing of a 
Grammar school in each district of the Province, and very soon three 
excellent schools were doing good work in Cornwall, Kingston and Niagara. 
But the out-lying regions were still without proper schools. He continued 
his efforts and very soon a number of fairly good schools were established 
throughout the Province. 

But he was not satisfied with this and desired to see higher education 
make its way in the Province. For this purpose he advocated the 
establishment of a University in Upper Canada. The authorities sympa- 
thized with him, and he was sent to England to consult the Home 
government. He succeeded beyond his expectations. A university was to 
be established with a good endowment and a Royal Charter. To the modern 
reader the charter granted seems decidedly illiberal, but it must be 
remembered that it was an advance on anything granted by the State to 
education up to that time. The charter was granted on the following 
terms : 

" It was, therefore, provided that the seven Professors in the Arts and 
Faculties should be members of the Church of England, and should subscribe 
to the Thirty -nine Articles ; that the Bishop, for the time being, of the Diocese 



270 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

in which the Uniyersity was situate should be the Visitor ; the Governor, or 
Lieutenant-Governor, for the time being, the Chancellor ; the President to be 
a clergyman in holy orders of the United Church of England and Ireland ; 
and that the Archdeacon of York in this Province, for the time being, 
should, by virtue of such his office, be at all times the President of the said 
College." 

In 1827, for Church purposes. Upper Canada was divided into two 
Archdeaconries. Dr. Stuart became Archdeacon of Kingston and Dr. 
Strachan, Archdeacon of York. 

In the year following his promotion to the Archdeaconry of York, Dr. 
Strachan began the great battle of his life. At the election the Reform party 
had as their election cries Clergy Reserves and the University, and Dr. 
Strachan was foremost in the fight on behalf of the Church of England. 

In 1832 Asiatic cholera reached America and swept through the whole , 
of Canada. It was a time to try men, and Dr. Strachan proved himself a 
hero. He never shirked his duty and fearlessly visited the sick and dying. 
His services at this critical time were as much appreciated as they had been 
during the war of 1812, and the inhabitants of York presented him with a 
piece of plate in recognition of the work he had done during the trying 
months of the plague. In 1833 he was to receive another token of the 
respect in which he was held. His old pupils of the Cornwall School still 
held him in reverence, and presented him with a valuable piece of plate to 
show how highly he was esteemed by them. " This was a massive silver 
Epergn§, value 230 guineas ; the base of which, particularly chaste and 
elegant in proportions and design, supports four classical figures, representing 
Religion, History, Poetry and Geography ; and surrounding a column 
around which twine the ivy and acanthus, the whole surmounted with a 
wreath. "Within the square of the pedestal, not exposed to view, are 
engraven the names and place of residence of the gentlemen who presented 
this tribute." Among these names were such distinguished men as John 
Beverley Robinson, George Ridout, J. B. Macaulay, Jonas Jones and his 
biographer and successor in the See of Toronto, A. N. Bethune. 



BISHOP STRACHAN. 271 

Archdeacon Strachan continued to put forth strenuous efforts on behalf 
of the Church, and among his other works was the establishment of a 
periodical, The Church. 

He continued to occupy a place in the Legislative Council and his 
enemies strongly objected to this. They were making their influence felt 
with the Home government and Lord Ripon advised that the " Bishop of 
Regiopolis and the Archdeacon of York should altogether abstain from any 
interference in any secular matters which might be submitted in the 
Legislative Council." The Archdeacon of York was not one to give up what 
he considered to be a right without a battle, and he continued to take an 
active part in politics. However, matters were to undergo a change. The 
struggle which was going on at this time ended in the rebellion of 1837, and 
the Home government, through Lord Durham's report, saw the need of 
re-adjusting legislation in the Canadas to suit the growing needs of the 
country. 

He was now to sustain, for the time being, what was to him a great 
personal loss. In 1839 the Church of St. James was burned, but the 
Archdeacon went to work with his usual energy and soon had a much more 
magnificent building rising from the ruins of the old church. In August of 
this same year he went to England, and was there consecrated the first Bishop 
of Toronto, and on the 22nd of December was installed in his new church, 
the Cathedral of St. James, which still stands a monument to his energy and 
zeal. 

Mr. Poulett Thomson, afterwards Lord Sydenham, came to Canada to 
carry out the principles laid down in Lord Durham's Report. One of his first 
acts was to endeavor to settle the Clergy Reserves question. The message on 
this question sent down by the Governor-General was far from being satis- 
factory to the Bishop of Toronto, and he addressed a pastoral letter to the 
clergy and laity of his diocese pointing out that the step taken was 
"calculated to deprive the church of England in Canada of nearly three- 
fourths of her lawful property, to render clergy stipendiaries and dependants 
on the Colonial government, and to foster and perpetuate endless division 



272 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

and discord." However, the House of Assembly passed the Bill by a 
majority of twenty-eight to twenty, and the Governor-General believed that 
the question was now forever settled. He said with regard to the Bill : 

"By the Bill which you have passed for the disposal of the Clergy 
Reserves, you have, so far as your constitutional powers admit, set at rest a 
question which, for years past, has convulsed society in this Province. In 
framing that measure, you have consulted alike the best interests of religion, 
and the future peace and welfare of the people, for whose services you are 
called upon to legislate; and I rely on your efforts proving successful, 
notwithstanding any attempt which may be made to renew excitement, or to 
raise opposition to your deliberate and recorded judgment." 

Bishop Strachan's work was to make itself felt, and when the matter 
came up before the leading members of the Lords and Commons the Bill was 
to undergo radical change, and when finally passed, August 7, 1840, it was 
one that gave considerable satisfaction to the Bishop of Toronto. In 
considering this matter The Church newspaper was able to say-: " It is with 
all well-disposed persons a subject for congratulation that a topic of grievance 
has thus been removed, and most heartily do we hope and pray that it will 
not soon be followed by another equally groundless and disquieting." 

Dr. Strachan had for some years been agitating for a university. It had 
been deemed wise first to establish a school where pupils might qualify for 
the projected university, and Upper Canada College had resulted ; but in 
1842 the Bishop's desire was to be realized. In that year Charles Bagot, 
successor to Lord Sydenham, visited Toronto, and while there laid the 
corner-stone of King's College, and two months later the university of King's 
College was opened with fitting ceremony. 

As Bishop of Toronto he had no sinecure. His work for the summer 
months of 1840 illuatrates admirably the amount of labor he had to put forth 
t)n behalf of his widely-scattered diocese. Between June 10, and October 21, 
of that year he visited seventy-eight stations, confirmed 2,923 people, 
consecrated five churches and two burial grounds, and delivered 155 sermons 
and addresses. In doing this work he travelled 2,277 miles ; and it must be 
remembered that he travelled, for the most part, over roads of the roughest type. 



BISHOP STRACHAN. 273 

King's College was not to have a peaceful career. Scarcely was the 
corner-stone laid before, the enemies of Dr. Strachan began to attack the 
institution. An attempt was made to remodel the College, and in 1848 when 
the Reformers were in power the name of King's College was dropped and 
that of the University of Toronto adopted. It was moreover decreed that 
there should be no faculty of divinity in- the university, and that " there 
should be no professorship, lectureship or teachership of divinity within it." 

Bishop Strachan now determined to work for the establishment of a 
Church University apart altogether from State Aid. He appealed to the 
clergy and laity of the diocese and headed a subscription list himself with a 
gift of £1,000. He endeavored to have Her Majesty's government disallow 
the act abolishing King's College. He failed in this, but succeeded in getting 
a charter for the new college he proposed to establish. 

He was now an old man past the three score and ten, but he went to 
England and worked with such energy on behalf of his projected college, that 
he succeeded through the help of such men as Lord Seaton and Mr. Gladstone 
in raising the handsome sum of £15,000 for the new university. As a result 
of his efforts Trinity College was formally opened in January, 1852. 

He continued for fifteen years more to work on behalf of his Church 
and the Province. He actively opposed the secularization of the Clergy 
Reserves in 1854, and in 1860 when the Prince of Wales visited Canada he 
was one of the most prominent figures at his reception. 

When the Fenian Raid broke out he spoke with no feeble voice, but 
denounced the raiders as murderers and marauders. The end of his life was 
not far distant. He had been invited to attend the Pan- Anglican Conference 
of Bishops held at Lambert Place, September 24, 1867, but on account of his 
health was unable to do so. On October 19 he attended, for the last time, his 
beloved Cathedral, and on November 1, All Saints' Day, passed quietly away. 
He had been a force in the Church and State and friends and enemies felt 
that they should do him honor, and a public funeral was accorded the man 
who had based the education of Upper Canada, and who had done much to 
train many of the leading statesmen and business men of the Province. 



CHAPTER XVIL 

I>R. EGERTON RYERSOM. 

Dr. Egerton Ryersou of United Empire I,oyalist Stock — His Father Receives a Grant of 

Laid in Upper Canada — Young Ryerson Early a Lover of Books — His Education — A 
Deeply Religious Nature — Joins the Methodist Communion — An Usher in the London 
District Grammar School — A Diligent Student — Returns to His Father's Farm — A 
Missionary to the Indians on the Credit — Crosses Swords with Archdeacon Strachan on 
the Clergy Reserves Question — His Attitude Towards the Church of England — The 
"Christian Guardian" Established — Goes to England in the Interests of the Canadian 
Methodist Church — Gives His Impressions of English Public Men — Denounced by 
"William Lyon Mackenzie as an Apostate — His Active Opposition to the Rebellious 
Tendencies in Upper Canada — Sent to England in the Interests of Upper Canada Academy 

His Words at the Close of the Patriots' War — His Battle with Sir Francis Bond Head 

over Grant to Upper Canada Academy — His Generosity to Political Opponents — 
Appointed Principal of Victoria College — Appointed Superintendent of Public Schools in 
Upper Canada — His Theory of Education — Establishes the "Journal of Education" — 
Completes his "History of the Loyalists of America and Their Timet" — ^The Close of 
His Life. 

A FITTING companion study for Bishop Strachan is that of Dr. Egerton 
Ryerson. They were both scholarly men, both strong and somewhat 
stubborn men, and both were animated with a zeal for God and an 
exalted patriotism. In many ways they were, howeyer, diametrically 
opposed to each other. 

Dr. Ryerson was of United Empire Loyalist stock, his father haying 
fought in the British army during the War of the Revolution. Much of Dr. 
Ryerson's austerity of character was inherited from his mother, who was a 
descendant of one of the earliest settlers in Massachusetts. "When the War of 
the Revolution came to a close, and the Thirteen Colonies were victors in the 
struggle, Ryerson, with many other loyal Britishers, settled in New 
Brunswick. It was in these first years of his settlement in British North 
America that he met his wife. Not finding the climate or the soil of New 
Brunswick congenial, however, and attracted by the excellent offers held out 
274 




HON. GEORGE W. ROSS, LL.D. 



DR. EGERTON RYERSON. 



277 



to settlers in Canada the United Empire Loyalist journeyed westward ; and 
with a pension, which he received from the British government, and a grant 
of some twenty-five hundred acres of land, he could be considered fairly 
well-to-do, even if his property was, for the most part, forest land. From the 
beginning he was a figure of some prominence in Upper Canada, and in 1800 
was appointed High Sheriff of the London district. He held this office until 
1806, but by this time his farm was demanding all his attention, and for the 
future he devoted his entire energies to agriculture. 

His son Egerton was born in 1803, He was soon a sturdy lad, and from 
his earliest years was an energetic worker on " his father's farm. He early 
developed a love for books, and was encouraged by both his parents in his 
studies. The schools in Western Canada were, at the beginning of the 
century, exceedingly wretched institutions, taught, for the most part, by men 
who had failed in every other walk in life. Fortunately, however, young 
Ryerson had the advantage of an excellent teacher. Mr. James Mitchell, in 
scholarship and ability as an instructor, was a man second only to Dr. 
Strachan, and the care he devoted to his brilliant young pupil was not 
lost 

From Egerton Ryerson's boyhood days he showed a strength of character 
and depth of feeling beyond his years. At the age of twelve he became 
deeply religious and continued a zealous follower of Christ until the end of 
his life. His own reminiscent words with regard to this stage of his career 
show well how deep and mature a nature his was even when a boy : 

" At the close of the American War, in 1815, when I was twelve years 
of age, my three elder brothers, George, William and John, became deeply 
religious and I imbibed the same spirit. My consciousness of guilt and 
sinfulness was humbling, oppressive and distressing ; and my experience of 
relief, after lengthened fastings, watchings and prayers, was clear, refreshing 
and joyous. In the end I simply trusted in Christ, and looked to Him for a 
present salvation ; and as I looked up in my bed, the light appeared to my 
mind, and, as I thought, to my bodily eye also, in the form of One, white- 
robed, who approached the bedside with a smile, and with more of the 
expression (y" the countenance of Titian's Christ than of any person whom I 



278 BUILDEKS OF CANADA. 

have ever seen. I turned, rose to my knees, bowed my head, and covered 
my face, rejoiced with trembling, saying to a brother who was lying beside 
me, that the Saviour was now near us. The change within was more marked 
than anything without, and perhaps the inward change may have suggested 
what appeared an outward manifestation. I henceforth had new views, new 
feelings, new joys, and new strength. I truly delighted in the law of the 
Lord, after the inward man, and 

'Jesus, all the day long, was my joy and my song.* 

" From that time I became a diligent student, and new quickness and 
strength seemed to be imparted to my understanding and memory. 
While working on the farm I did more than an ordinary day's work, that it 
might show how industrious, instead of lazy, as some said, religion made a 
person. I studied between three and six o'clock in the morning, carried a 
book in my pocket during the day to improve odd moments by reading or 
learning, and then reviewed my studies of the day aloud while walking out 
in the evening." 

For several years young Ryerson wsus attracted by the Methodists, a 
decidedly unpopular body among the United Empire Loyalists of Upper 
Canada. At length, when eighteen years of age, he felt so strongly that he 
joined their communion much against the wishes of his father, who said to 
him that he must either leave them or leave his house. Egerton had no 
hesitation in making his choice. He was the stuff that martyrs are made of, 
and he went forth to face the battle of life for himself accompanied by his 
mother's prayers. He was fortunate in getting a position as usher in the 
London District Grammar School. Much of the teaching in this institution 
fell upon him and he proved himself an efficient instructor. 

He gave considerable of his time to the classics, but was attracted more 
by books of a philosophical bent. In the meantime his father was feeling 
his loss to the farm keenly, and at length requested him to come homo. He 
did so and showed that his two years with books had taken away nothing 
from his power as a farm laborer. However, he could not rest satisfied with 
plowing, and digging, and planting, and felt that work was laid upon him 
which could only be accomplished by continuing his life as a stuOent. 



DR. EGERTON RYEESOH. 279 

He determined to enter the Methodist ministry, and for this purpose went 
to Hamilton where there was a good school. He overworked himself, was 
prostrated with sickness and had a narrow escape from death. His father 
was anxious that he should once more assist him with his farm, but Egerton 
felt that the " vows of God " were upon him, and " after long and painful 
struggles " decided to devote his " life and all to the ministry of the 
Methodist Church." 

The early part of his ministerial career was far from being easy. He had 
to travel much on horse-back and on foot over rough regions and to minister 
to people poor in the extreme. He was early appointed a missionary to the 
Indians on the Credit and to some extent lived their lives, sleeping in their 
wigwams on a rough mat-covered plank for a couch. He desired a suitable 
place of worship for his rude congregation and he appealed to the Indians 
themselves and found them willing contributors. 

But by far the most interesting incident of his early ministerial career 
was his controversy over the Clergy Reserves with Archdeacon Strachan. 
The Archdeacon was the champion of the Church of England against all 
other Churches, but particularly against the Methodists, whom he looked 
upon as interlopers, introducing a life and ideas out of keeping with the 
British constitution and British institutions. He made a vigorous attack on 
all dissenting bodies and the Methodists felt so keenly on account of the 
references made against themselves that they looked about for some suitable 
person to reply to the strong language of their brilliant enemy. Young 
Ryerson was chosen for the work, and made a reply that startled the friends 
of the Established Church and convinced many of the righteousness of his 
contentions. Once more his poor father was deeply grieved at the position 
his son was taking in the country, and when he learned that Egerton was 
the author of the attack upon Archdeacon Strachan he felt as though his son 
was hopelessly lost and was dragging down his family with him. However, 
it was a mere battle for the right. Egerton Ryerson had lost none of his 
affection for the Church of England, but he believed that the Church with 
which he had associated his life was better able to do good work in the 
Colonies. 



280 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

During his controversy with Dr. Strachan he stated very clearly his 
attitude towards the Church out of whose fold he had come. 

" Whatever remarks the Doctor's discourse may require me to make, I 
wish it to be distinctly understood that I mean no reflection on the doctrines, 
•liturgy or discipline of the Church of which he has the honor to be a 
minister. Be assured I mean no such thing. I firmly believe in her 
doctrines, I admire her liturgy, and I heartily rejoice in the success of those 
principles which are therein contained, and it is for the prosperity of the 
truths which they unfold that I shall ever pray and contend. And, with 
respect to Church government I heartily adopt the sentiments of the pious and 
the learned Bishop Burnet, that that form of Church government is the best 
which is most suitable to the customs and circumstances of the people among 
whom it is established." 

Shortly after the beginning of the Clergy Reserves controversy, in which 
he took such an active part, he was asked to accept ordination in the Church 
of England. He refused, as he felt he had a wider field of usefulness in the 
Methodist body. The struggle for religious liberty on which he had entered 
was by no means won. It is true the Legislative Assembly were, for the most 
part, with him, but the Legislative Council, the official class in the Province, 
and the Lieutenant-Governor was bitterly opposed to him. However, he was 
the kind of man whom opposition only made stronger and more determined. 
The cause he was advocating required a newspaper to advance its interests, 
and so the Christian Guardian was established in 1829 ; and he became its 
joint editor and shortly afterwards had entire editorial charge. He wrote 
ably in the interests of reform and the Methodist Church and gained many 
admirers especially among the Liberals of the Province. 

He went to England on Church business and found that English public 
men were antagonistic to the Methodists. They had been mis-informed with 
regard to them and looked upon them as a class in the community 
un-British, — ^indeed, disloyal to England and hoping for the advance of 
American institutions. He was able to disabuse the minds of those with 
whom he came in contact, and did not a little to pave the way for the work 
that was afterwards to be done by Lord Durham and Lord Sydenham. When 



DR. EGERTON KYERSOH. 



style ana ,it, a ,ood deal of .e>in,. h/sIX: T^L Jf rir°r 
who were professedly working in th» interest, of thf pT . '" 

denounced them. As a result of hi, „» °^ '"''^ vigorously 

upon hi. the wrath of WH, ^ ^ 'S^Zif ^ ^ ^ '" ^^"^^ <^°- 
" apostate " to the cause of „f °" ^''<=^«"^'«. who denounced him as an 

ceased -Hng *: Zpi jj ^ gu.trraT 'r""- ^"-^-- 

editorship Of it in June 183^ Aff ? ^"''^^ ^^^« "P ^^^ 

P-. coLct in hHttitude t^TZri' ''''''-■ '^ ''^^^ 
Through the column, of th. C.W. J «„ ": t'd .^^ ''-'■-• 
Howe did by means of th. ^r o . • '*""' ^« '"^-^ '» do what " Joe " 

a Dy means of the iVbra Scohan in the Maritime Provinces and h a 
there been many men of Dr. Ryerson's stamp in Upper CnrdlT . 
rebellion of 1837 might have been averted ' ' """^^PP^ 

one minister in the ^Ice and 1 sTr' ''' """'^''^ «^'^« ^^ "^"^ ^o^'7- 
But in 1835 there were Z^::.^' ^^l^^r' " '"^-^-• 
members. He had really been tha ^^d '^"'^''"^ <=hurch 

began his ministry. WhL he ' ' 7 T"' °' ''^"'°''''" ^'°- ^^ 

Ms valedicto. heLed .Llrto^ ^ 1:^.^ "^ ^" 

and pnvately. I have written what I thought best for th ' "'"'' 

the cause of Methodism, and the civil interest of t u^Th '^^'°"' ' 
received one acre of land, nor on, farthin. ft « country. I have never 
Puhlic money. I have ne'v.r writLm?: Xr;;" °^ ^ 
connected with the Government. I count it to b ,^ I T ^^ P'"°° 

I can aspire .« be a Methodist preacheT .Id L ' T-^'' '"'''' "> ^'^^^ 

-^ to ,H. world I ,h.U count it my i C;;tT • t '''''-'' 
course." ^ "ignest joy to finish my earthly 



282 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

After severing his connection with the Guardian he was stationed 
at Kingston. As Kingston was a Tory stronghold he expected to make many 
enemies there ; but, as he was at this time held in ill-repute by the RadicalSj 
his attitude on the Clergy Reserves seems to have been almost forgotten. A< 
any rate he was kindly received by the people of Kingston and made many 
" warm friendships." He entered heart and soul into his ministry and mel 
with the fullest measure of success. He was in every way a strong man, and 
whether he worked on his father's farm, entered into a controversy, 
contributed articles to the press or ministered the gospel, he did it with an 
energy that never failed of his purpose. He was not to remain long in 
Kingston. The rapidly growing Methodist body in Upper Canada demanded 
better educational facilities than they had at that time. They wished to have 
a college of their own in which their ministers might be trained. To bring 
this about it would be necessary to send a delegate to England to obtain a 
charter and raise funds. There could be no doubt as to what man should be 
sent. Egerton Ryerson was easily the ablest and shrewdest business man in 
the Methodist Church in Upper Canada, and so towards the end of 1836 he 
set out a second time for the Old Land. He was eminently successful in his 
mission, and before he left England, early in 1837, had succeeded in inducing 
the Imperial government to recommend a grant by the Upper Canada 
Legislature to Upper Canada Academy. He did not return to Canada until 
June, 1837. Affairs were in a very much disturbed condition. Rebellion 
broke out and was opposed by him from first to last, and his attitude did not 
a little to keep the men of Upper Canada loyal at a time when British 
institutions were threatened in North America. 

He had been warned that it would be dangerous for him to visit Toronto, 
but when he arrived in the town about the middle of December the rebellion 
had already been put down. In a letter to his father he clearly sets forth his 
own attitude towards the " Patriots' War." He had been consistent from the 
commencement in his articles dealing with the revolutionary tendency in the 
Province and had now nothing to take back. 



DR. EGERTON RYERSON. 283 

" It is remarkable," he wrote, " that every man, with very few 
exceptions, who has left our Church and joined in the unprincipled crusade 
which has been made against us, has either been an active promoter of this 
plot or so far connected with it as to be ruined in his character and prospects 
by the timely discovery and defeat of it. I have been deeply affected at 
hearing of some unhappy examples, among old acquaintances, of this 
description. I feel thankful that I have been enabled to do my duty from 
the beginning in this matter. Four years ago, I perceived and began, to 
warn the public of the revolutionary tendency and spirit of Mackenzie's 
proceedings. Perhaps you may recollect that in a long article in the 
Guardian, four years ago this winter, headed 'Revolutionary Symptoms,' 
I pointed out, to the great displeasure of even some of my friends, what has 
come to pass. 

" It is also a matter of thankfulness that every one of our family and 
marriage connections, near and remote, is on the side of law, reason and 
religion in this affair. Such indications of the Divine goodness are a fresh 
encouragement to me to renew my covenant engagement with my gracious 
Redeemer, to serve Him and His cause with greater zeal and faithfulness." 

Sir Francis Bond Head had been instructed by Lord Glenelg to bring 
the matter of the Upper Canada Academy before the Legislature. This was 
done, and the Assembly granted $16,400 to the Academy. The Legislative 
Council defeated the purposes of the bill. Sir Francis Bond Head delayed 
payment of the money, and it was not until after the return of Dr. Ryerson 
to Canada, and a vigorous advocacy of the cause of the Academy, that justice 
was finally done in this case. 

He had not been in sympathy with the spirit of the rebellion, but signed 
a petition for the mitigation of the death sentence of Lount and Mathews. 
He vigorously defended Bidwell, who had made an enemy of Sir Francis 
Bond Head, and later in life was generous to even such an extreme Radical 
as William Lyon Mackenzie. After the suppression of the rebellion he was 
urged to once more take the editorship of the Guardian. This he did in 
July, 1838, and continued to write what he believed "to be the truth, 
leaving to others the exercise of a judgment equally unbiased and free." 



284 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

He took charge of the Guardian at a critical time in the history of Canada, a 
time when a strong man was needed to assist in fighting the battl© for 
representative institutions. It was a time when those who fought for 
representative government ard against the exclusive claims of the repre- 
sentatives of the Church of England were denounced as rebels and 
republicans, and it was well that the Guardian had in its editorial chair a 
man whose loyalty could not be impugned, and who had so early in his 
career shown the sanity of his views on the question of reform. 

In 1841 he was to enter upon a new sphere of usefulness. Lord 
Sydenham gave the royal assent to a bill for the erectioQ of Upper Canada 
Academy into a College with University powers. Dr. Ryerson, as the ablest 
man in the Methodist body, was appointed principal of the new (Victoria) 
College, and he was installed as principal in June, 1842. He continued to 
take an active part in public affairs, and during the struggle between Sir 
Charles Metcalfe and his constitutional advisers he took the part of Sir 
Charles and wrote a series of nine articles in his defence. He believed 
that his Excellency's exertions " would be crowned with a glorious yictory 
to his own credit, the honor of the British Crown, the strengthening of our 
connection with the motherland and to the great future benefit of Canada." 
Dr. Strachan could hardly have written in a more loyal vein. Naturally 
many of the Reformers looked upon Dr. Ryerson as having gone over to 
the Tories ; but they did not understand the man. The spirit that made 
him attack the extreme Radicals before the Rebellion was the same that 
made him rush to the defence of Sir Charles Metcalfe. 

In 1844 Dr. Ryerson was appointed Superintendent of Public Schools in 
Upper Canada, and is truly the father of the Ontario Public School System. 
Until 1876 he continued to work energetically on behalf of the education of 
the Province. He made no fewer than five tours of inspection in Europe and 
the United States, and visited such centres of education as England, Belgium, 
France, Prussia, etc. As a result of his first visit he prepared a report on a 
"system of public instruction for Upper Canada," and shows in this report 
that he had the true conception of education. 



Da. EGERTON RYERSON. 287 

" By education," he wrote, " I mean not the mere acquisition of certain 
arti, or of certain branches of knowledge, but that instruction and discipline 
which qualify and dispose the subjects of it for their appropriate duties and 
appointments in life, as Christians, as persons in business, and also as 
members of the civil community in which they live. 

" A basis of educational structure adapted to this end should be as broad 
as the population of the country ; and its loftiest elevation should equal the 
highest demands of the learned professions ; adapting its graduation of schools 
to the wants of the several classes of the community, and to their respective 
employments or professions, the one rising above the other — the one 
conducting to the other; yet each complete in itself for the degree of 
education it imparts ; a character of uniformity, as to fundamental principles, 
pervading the whole : the whole based upon the principles of Christianity, and 
uniting the combined influence and support of the government and the 
people. 

"The branches of knowledge which it is essential that all should 
understand, should be provided for all, and taught to all ; should be brought 
within the reach of the most needy, and forced upon the attention of the 
most careless. The knowledge required for the scientific pursuit of mechanics, 
agriculture and commerce, must needs be provided to an extent corresponding 
with the demands and exigencies of the country ; while, to a more limited 
extent, are needed facilities for acquiring the higher education of the learned 
professions." 

Towards the ideals laid down in this report he worked during the 
remainder of his life and those who now control the educational affairs of the 
Province are but building on the foundation laid by Dr. Ryerson. In 1848 
he established the Journal of Education and for twenty-eight years continued 
to edit it, but, in 1876, the government, in its wisdom, saw fit to abolish the 
Chief Superintendent's office and re-organize the Education Department with 
a Minister of Education at its head. Dr. Ryerson then retired into private 
life, but he could not remain idle. He had, indeed, for twenty years been 
engaged on his exhaustive work, the History of the Loyalists of America and 
ihrnr Times, and he now set himself industriously to complete it, and in 



288 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

1880 this celebrated book was published. He had now not long to live. 
" Gradually the weary wheels of life stood still," to quote the words of the 
editor of his Story of My Life, "and at seven o'clock February 19, 1882, in 
the presence of his loved ones and dear friends gently and peacefully the 
spirit of Egerton Ryerson took its flight to be forever with the Lord." 



CHAPTER XVIIL 

LOKD DURHAM. 

L,ord Durham a Londoner — Educated at Eton School — Enters the Army — Shows Marked 
Ability on Public Questions— In the House of Commons— In the House of Lords — Lord 
Privy Seal in the Grey Administration — Appointed Minister to St. Petersburg — The 
Rebellion of 1837 in Canada — Lord Durham Chosen to Save the Situation — The Causes of 
Discontent in Upper Canada— The End of the Quixotic Rising Under Mackenzie — The 
President of the United States Forbids American Citizens to Aid the Canadian Rebels — 
The Causes of the Rebellion in Lower Canada — The Leaders in the Rebellion — The 
Conflict at St. Denis— The Death of Lieutenant Weir— The Cruel Slaughter of the Rebels 
of St. Eustache — The Bishop of Montreal Pathetically Sums Up the Results of the 
Rebellion — The English Government Takes Action— Earl of Durham Appointed to Clear 
up Matters in British North America — Proceeds to Canada with Considerable Pomp and 
Display — His Arrival at Quebec — Proves Himself Firm Yet Generous — Mr. Charles 
Buller's Good Work — Lord Durham's Treatment of the Rebels — His Action Disallowed by 
the Home Government — Indignantly Resigns Office — The Effects of the English Parlia- 
ment's Action on the Canadian Situation — Lord Durham Returns to England Without 
Having Obtained Leave— ^His Conduct Investigated by the House — His Able Report on 
Canadian Affairs — His Early Death, 

THE RIGHT HON. GEORGE LAMBTON, first Earl of Durham, 
although residing for but a few brief months in Canada, had as much 
to do with the making of the great Dominion as any other of her 
statesmen. He came to this country for a special purpose, — to clear up a 
difficult situation created by decades of jealousy and hatred ; and although 
he was not to live to see the full fruits of his work with regard to the 
Canadas, his ideas were to prevail and the future of the country was to be 
built on the foundation of his celebrated Report. 

Lord Durham was a native of London, born in Berkeley Square, on 
April 12, 1792. He received his early education at Eton School, but when 
only seventeen years old entered the army and remained at military service 
for only one year, — probably the severe discipline was irksome to his 
haughty and insubordinate spirit. He early took an interest in public 
questions, and showed marked ability as a publicist, and was elected to the 

289 



290 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

House of Commons in the Whig interests at the ag© of twenty-one. From 
the beginning of his public career, while showing much power, he likewise 
displayed much weakness. He was unable to brook opposition, and his hot 
temper and reckless language made him many enemies. In 1828 he was 
elevated to the peerage and took his seat in the House of Lords. In the 
Grey administration he became Lord Privy Seal, but after quarreling with 
his friends resigned office. He continued to be a source of fear to his 
enemies and of anxiety to his political friends, but despite his stormy nature 
had a magnetism that gave many confidence in him and made them believe 
that in time his future would be a brilliant one. 

However, it was deemed best by those in authority to give him a foreign 
appointment where he would, in all probability, have a clear field to himself, 
and so in 1835 he was chosen as Minister to St. Petersburg, but those who 
did not like him questioned the wisdom of this appointment and in anger he 
resigned. In 1837, when Queen Victoria ascended the English throne she 
showed her appreciation of Lord Durham's ability by creating him a G.C.B. 
When she began her rule Canada was in a much disturbed condition, and 
it was not long before the sword was drawn on behalf of responsible 
government. A strong, well-balanced mind was needed to save the situation 
in a land where there were not only two political parties at civil strife, but 
where two distinct nationalities were bitterly opposing each other. It would 
bo no easy matter to shape the destiny of England's greatest Colony. The 
acts already passed only seemed to have created feuds. It now seems strange 
that a man of Lord Durham's record should have been chosen to deal with 
such a critical situation. His ability was undoubted, but his hot temper was 
not suited to cin^imstances that demanded calmness and equipoise of 
character. 

The causes of the social dissatisfaction that ultimately ended in reb^lion 
were deep-seated, and some of them were as old, indeed, as the War of the 
Revolution ; but irhaX is generally known as the " Family Compact " was 
largely to blame for the state of affairs that led to the rebellious outbreak 
under the leadership of a few hot-headed Radicals such as William Lyon 
Mackenae. Sprinkled throughout Upper Canada were many officials who 



LORD DURHAM, 291 

had fought under Simcoe and other British leaders and who had, in not a 
few cases, made big sacrifices to live under the British flag they so dearly loved. 
Along with thest were other Britishers who had come to Canada as settlers 
after the opening up of the Upper Province. These men, in many cases, 
looked upon the original settlers, and, indeed, on many of the United Empire 
Loyalists, with more or less scorn. The spoils of office fell into the hands of 
these two classes, and in all places of trust and power were men who had 
but little sympathy with the democratic life slowly but surely asserting itself 
in British North America. Many of these officials were related, or became so 
by marriage, and endeavored to keep all patronage within their own little 
circle. What they had suffered, or what they thought they had suffered in 
the past for the country they now ruled, their work, or the work of their 
ancestors during the War of the Revolution or the War of 1812, and the 
the power they were now exercising, gave them a feeling of ownership in the 
Province. In this feeling they were encouraged by such brilliant scholars 
and astute thinkers as Bishop Strachan, who, despite his humble origin, had 
little toleration with the democratic spirit. Gradually, through the opening 
decades of the century, affairs went from bad to worse. Hot words were 
exchanged. There were but few men to reason with the Radicals, and such 
men as Mackenzie and Gourlay were not prepared to listen to reason. At 
length a rising was planned, and the authorities stood aloof and allowed it 
to come to a head. 

"The rebels were to convene at a spot a few miles north of Toronto on 
Yonge street, on a certain day (7th December, 1837), armed with pikes and 
such arms as might be gathered at their homes. They were to march into the 
city at night, take possession of the arms in the City Hall, and then seize the 
person of the Lieutenant-Governor, and any others who resisted their 
proceedings. They expected many of the citizens to at once join their force, 
and others to remain quiet. A new Government was to be organized (a 
Republican Government), and Dr. Rolph was already selected to occupy the 
office of President. Thereafter, it was believed, the people of the Province 
would bow in submission to the newly-constituted administration." 



292 - BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

This little force of some eight hundred men without funds, without 
arms, without leaders, as was to be expected, fled before the body of militia 
that was sent out against them. A more quixotic rising never took place. 
The leaders escaped to the United States, and the blackest stain on the career 
of William Lyon Mackenzie was the appeal made to the Americans for help. 
But now that the authorities had taken the matter up they showed 
themselves ready to grapple with the serious situation that had arisen, and 
the destruction by Lieutenant Drew of the " Caroline," which was carrying 
stores from the United States for the rebels on Navy Island, showed that the 
Canadians would brook no outside interference. However, there was little 
danger from the United States, as within a month of the rebel gathering at 
Montgomery's Tavern, the President of the United States issued a procla- 
mation forbidding American citizens to aid the rebels in arms against the 
Canadian government. 

While affairs were thus in Upper Canada they were still more serious in 
the Lower Province. The majority of the inhabitants had genuine 
grievances, and these were intensified by race hatred against the dominant 
class. Three years previously ninety-two resolutions, containing the 
grievances of which the French Canadians complained, were sent to England, 
and many of these were genuine ones, and yet there seemed no redress. Mr. 
N. E. Dionne thus enumerates the causes of the outbreak in the Province of 
Quebec as follows : 

" 1. The vicious composition of the Legislative Council, of which the 
Judges of the Court of Appeal were members. 

*' 2. The participation by the appointed Legislative Councillors in 
popular elections. 

" 3. The hostility of the Legislative Council towards the Legislative 
Assembly and vice versa. 

*' 4. The accumulation of public offices in the hands ot certain favorites 
of the Administration. 

" 6. The inadequate distribution of public offices. 

" 6. The distribution of public lands amongst friends of the Government 
to the detriment of colonization. 



LORD DURHAM. 293 

" 7. The too frequent checking of the passage of Bills adopted by the 
Assembly. 

*' 8. The need for the people of a greater liberty and a responsible 
ministry." 

In Lower Canada were a number of brilliant men, but, like the 
leaders in Upper Canada, they lacked balance. When these men saw that there 
was little hope of the immediate redress of the grievances suffered by their 
Province they could not wait patiently, but began to incite the people to 
rebellion. Among them were such orators as Dr. Wolfred Nelson, Dr. Cote 
and M. Marchesseau. The press of the country was, for the most part, with 
them. However, one paper, at least, Le Canadien, pointed out the folly of 
resorting to arms. The Church, too, gave its warning, but the popular leaders 
held their meetings in different parts of the Province and M. Papineau 
denounced, in violent language that could only lead to rebellion, the tyranny 
of the ruling body. Violence began in November in the streets of Montreal 
and the flames of rebellion soon spread to other parts of the Province. On 
the 23rd of the month an attack was made on the rebels in St. Denis and the 
government forces were compelled to retreat. It was at this time that 
Lieutenant Weir was murdered — an act which did much to cause the 
unfortunate rebels later to receive such brutal treatment at the hands of Sir 
John Colborne and his forces. 

Determined efforts were now to be made to crush .the rebellion. St. 
Charles and St. Denis were captured and at St. Eustache, where a 
comparatively small body of rebels had taken shelter in a church, a cruel and 
bloody slaughter took place. The rebellion was effectually stamped out and 
the rebel leaders were in flight. 

The immediate results of this appeal to arms is thus pathetically given 
in the words of the Bishop of Montreal. " What misery, what desolation, is 
spread broadcast through many of our fields and homes since the scourge of 
civil war has ravaged a happy country where abundance and joy reigned 
with order and safety, before brigands and rebels by force of sophistries and 
lies had led astray a part of the population. What remains to you of their 
grand promises? Was it the desire of the majority of the people, who. 



294 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

according to these principles, sbould control eyerything in the State, to go 
into armed conflict ? Was there any general concurrence in the opera tiona 
of the insurgents ? Are you free, when in menacing you with all sorts of 
taxation, with incendiarism, with the loss of all your property, with death 
itself if you did not submit to their frightful despotism, they forced more 
than half of the small number who took arms against our august Sovereign 
to march against her victorious armies ?" 

The words of the Bishop were in a sense too true and yet the misguided 
patriots had not died in vain. England, slow to move in time of peace, now 
moved rapidly and the government determined to thoroughly investigate the 
situation, and provisions were to be made to prevent the possibility of such 
an outbreak in the future. 

When news of the insurrection reached England Lord John Russell in 
the House of Commons moved " for leave to bring in a bill by which, for a 
certain time, the calling of an Assembly in Lower Canada, which was 
incumbent on the government, for the time being, might be suspended and 
authority be given to meet the present emergency, and to provide for the 
future government of the Province." It was the duty of the government 
"to send to British North America a man conversant with matters of 
administration, with the most important matters which are, from time to 
time, brought before parliament as well as with the affairs of the various 
states of Europe and, moreover, that it should be implied by his nomination 
that he was favorable to popular feeUng aad popular rights." The Earl of 
Durham, a noble Radical, was chosen for the task of investigating affairs in 
the great English coloay across the Atlantic, and he proceeded to Canada 
with the hope of restoring the supremacy of the law, and expressing the wish 
that he might be " the humble instrument of conferring upon the British 
North America provinces such a free and liberal constitutiom as shall place 
them on the same scale of independence as the rest of the possesions of Great 
Britain." 

Many in England expected to see Lord Durham make a muddle of affairs 
in Canada. For a Radical he made a bad beginning. He was proceeding to 
a poor country and a democratic country, larg^y affe<^od by the republican 



r~^ 




. . /<^d 



.CT^'i 





LORD DURHAM. 



297 



ideas of the United States, and yet he went with a pomp and display that 
aristocrats delight in. His vessel was richly fitted out and he had with him 
a large retinue of servants, and on the voyage across was accompanied by a 
band of musicians to help pass the time merrily. If he went bearing the 
palm branch he was careful to have the sword at least ready to be 
unsheathed in case of any opposition to his rule. Two regiments of Royal 
Guards and some Hussars went with him. He reached Quebec on May 27, 
but did not land until the 29th, by which time preparations had been 
completed to give him a royal welcome. In his proclamation on landing he 
declared that " all disturbers of the peace," " all violaters of the law," " all 
enemies to the Crown and the British Empire " would find in him an 
uncompromising opponent ; but he likewise invited " the most free and 
unreserved communication from the people of British North America, and 
begged them to consider him as a friend and an arbitrator ready to listen at 
all times to their complaints and grievances ; for, as he said, he was fully 
determined to act with the strictest impartiality. 

He was fortunate in having with him at this time Mr. Charles Buller, a 
pupil of Thomas Carlyle's, a man of sound sense and great ability ; indeed the 
historian has very great difficulty in telling just how much of Durham's 
work was done by Buller. 

For a time things went smoothly and it looked as if Lord Durham was 
to meet with no great difficulty in remedying affairs in Canada. June 28, 
1838, was the day fixed for the coronation of Queen Victoria, and on this day 
he proclaimed an amnesty for all political offences committed during the 
rebellion. He made an exception with regard to some of the leaders, such as 
Wolfred Nelson, K S. Bouchette and others, who were to be exiled to 
Bermuda; of Louis Joseph Papineau, Dr. O'Callaghan and George Etienne 
Cartier and some thirteen others who had fled to the United States and who 
were threatened with death if they attempted to return of their own accord. 
This was a somewhat high-handed piece of business from a British point of 
view. Lord Brougham indignantly protested against it, declaring that these 
men had been condemned to death when not one of them had been previously 



298 BUIT.DERS OF CANADA. 

tried. " Such a proceeding," he said, " was contrary to the spirit of English 
law which humanely supposed every accused party to be innocent until he 
was proved guilty." 

Apart from the legal aspect of the affair Lord Durham's action was in 
the best interests of the case. The rebels had expected harsher terms and 
were glad to be let off so lightly. But his attempt at a remedy was to be 
suddenly checked by the action of the Home Government. The ordinance of 
Lord Durham was disallowed by Her Majesty's government. 

Lord Durham was indignant at the treatment meted out to one who had 
come to Canada armed, as he thought, with the highest authority, and 
determined to resign his office. On the 9th of October he issued a 
proclamation, which, according to Knight, " was a humiliating abrogation of 
the ordinance of the 28th of June." He then took a step which was, to say 
the least, decidedly unwise. It was his duty to remain in Canada until he 
received leave to return, but he now decided to desert his post without 
awaiting the sanction of the Home government. In his reply to an address 
given him by the French residents of Quebec he gave the following as the 
reason for his return : 

*' The proceedings in the House of Lords, acquiesced in by the Ministry, 
have deprived the government in this province of all moral power and 
consideration. They have reduced it to a state of executive nullity, and 
rendered it dependent on one branch of the Imperial legislature for the 
immediate sanction of each separate measure. In truth and in effect, the 
government here is now administered by two or three peers from their seats 
in parliament 

" In this novel and anomalous state of things, it would neither be for 
your advantage nor mine, that I should remain here. My post is, where your 
interests are really decided upon. In parliament I can defend your rights, 
declare your wants and wishes, and expose the impolicy and cruelty of 
proceedings, which whilst they are too liable to the imputation of having 
originated in personal animosity and party feeling, are also fraught with 
imminent danger to the welfare of these important colonies, to the 
permanence of their connection with the British empire." 



LORD DURHAM. 299 

The direction of affairs in the colony was left in the hands of Sir 
John Colborne. The differences between Lord Durham and the Home 
government had a decidedly dangerous tendency, and it looked for a time as 
if rebellion might break out again. But rebellion could not gather head and 
the severe measures adopted by Sir John Colborne frightened many of the 
malcontents into submission. 

When Lord Durham reached England he was in ill-health and the blow 
he had received seemed to have completely undermined his constitution. 
Lord Brougham's attack upon him found many supporters in England, where 
anything bordering on an illegal exercise of authority was frowned down 
upon. However, he had defenders who believed that his policy, under the 
circumstances, was the correct one. He certainly had, in the brief time he 
was in Canada, grasped the situation fully, told the causes, and at least, 
suggested the remedy. In his celebrated Report he said : " From first to 
last I have discerned in these dissensions which fill the parliamentary history 
of Lower Canada, that the Assembly has always been at war with the Council 
relative to powers which are essential to be possessed by the former through 
the very nature of representative institutions." He had a remedy to present, 
and in his Report proposed " that the Crown should give up all its revenues, 
except those derived from land sales, in exchange for a proper civil list. 
That all civil officers should be made responsible to the legislature, the 
governor and secretary always excepted ; that the independence of the 
judges should be recognized ; and, further, that the heads of ministerial 
departments should be bound to govern in accordance with the wishes of the 
majority in the two Chambers." 

The most interesting part of the Report was that in which he dealt with 
the great race question. He saw, perhaps more clearly than any other man 
I sent by England to govern in this country, that the greatest difficulty the 
Canadian people had to contend with was not a political one but a racial one. 
He feared for the future of the country and wrote a vigorous warning against 
permitting the French element to dominate the British Colony. The 
following extracts from his Report well show how strongly he felt with 
regard to this matter : 



300 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

" "Without going so far as to accuse the Assembly of a deliberate design to 
check the settlement and improvement of Lower Canada, it cannot be denied 
that they looked with considerable jealousy and dislike on the increase and 
prosperity of what they regarded as a foreign and hostile race ; they looked 
on the Province as the patrimony of their own race ; they viewed it not as 
a country to be settled, but as one already settled ; and instead of legislating 
in the American spirit, and first providing for the future population of the 
Province, their primary care was, in the spirit of legislation which prevails in 
the Old World, to guard the interests and feelings of the present race of 
inhabitants to whom they considered the new-comers as subordinate. They 
refused to increase the .burdens of the country by imposing taxes to meet 
the expenditure required for improvement, and they also refused to direct to 
that object any of the funds previously devoted to other purposes. The 
improvement of the harbour at Montreal was suspended from a political 
antipathy to a leading English merchant who had been the most active of 
the Commissioners, and by whom it had been conducted with the most 
admirable success. It is but just to say that some of the works which the 
Assembly authorized and encouraged were undertaken on a scale of due 
moderation and satisfactorily perfected and brought into operation. Others, 
especially the great communications which I have mentioned above, the 
Assembly showed a great reluctance to promote or even permit. 

"The treasonable attempt of the French party to carry its political 
objects into effect by an appeal to arms brought these hostile races into 
general and armed collision. I will not dwell on the melancholy scenes 
exhibited in the progress of the contest, or the fi@rce passions which held an 
unchecked sway during the insurrection or immediately after its suppression. 
It is not difficult to conceive how greatly the evils, which I have described as 
previously existing have been aggravated by the war ; how terror and revenge 
nourished in each portion of the population a bitter and irreconcilable hatred 
to each other, and to the institutions of the country. The French population 
who had for some time exercised a great and increasing power through the 
medium of the House of Assembly, found their hopes unexpectedly prostrated 
in the dust The physical force which they had vaunted was called into 



LORD DURHAM. 801 

action and proved to be utterly ineflBcient. The hopes of recovering their 
previous ascendency under a constitution, similar to that suspended, almost 
ceased to exist. Removed from all actual share in the government of their 
country, they brood in sullen silence over the memory of their fallen 
countrymen, of their burnt villages, of their ruined property, of their 
extinguished ascendency and their humbled nationality. To the Govern- 
ment and the English they ascribe these wrongs and nourish against both an 
indiscriminating and eternal animosity." 

Had he remained in Canada for a longer period he no doubt would have 
modified his opinion with regard to the French race. But his Report was to 
be of great value, and the difficulties he pointed out, sometimes with 
exaggeration, helped Lord Sydenham and Lord Elgin and others to steer 
clear of the rocks and shoals. 

His work in Canada practically ended his public career. On July 26, 
1839, he made his last speech in defence of his Canadian policy. In the 
following year, at the age of forty-eight, on July 28, death ended a career 
which, despite its many failures, had iu it still much of promisft 

IT 



CHAPTER XIX. 



LORD SYDENHAM. 



The Baxlj Career of Poulett Thomson— Begins Business Life In St. Petersburg— Physical 
Collapse and a lengthy Visit to the Health Resorts of Europe— A Fine Linguist— In an 
English Counting-House — Further Residence in Russia — One of the Keenest-Sighted and 
Most Polished Young Men of his Time — A Friend of Mr. Huskisson's — Becomes a Candi- 
date for the Borough of Dover — His Business Friends Opposed to this Step — A Power in 
the House of Commons — His Attitude Towards Free Trade — Appointed Vice-President of 
the Board of Trade — An Able Parliamentarian and Diplomat — Takes an Interest in the 
Canadian Situation Created by the Rebellion of 1837— Given a Choice between the 
Chancellorship of the Exchequer and the Government of Canada — Goes to Canada as 
Governor- General — Confident of Being Able to Grapple with the Critical Situation in 
British North America— Finds the People Friendly towards Him — A Strong Antipathy 
towards, him among the Tories of Upper Canada— Working for the Union— His Tri- 
umphant Words with Regard to his Success— Deals with the Clergy Reserves Question 
— Stands Aloof from both Political Parties — The Union Proclaimed — Suffers from Ill- 
Health— Meets with a Fatal Accident— His Death. 

MR. CHARLES EDWARD POULETT THOMSON was to follow 
in the wake of Lord Durham to endeavor to settle the difficulties 
that the noble and eccentric Lord had failed to settle, or, to be more 
just, had been prevented from settling by the interference of the Home 
government with his actions in British North America. Poulett Thomson, as 
he is known to Canadian historians, was the son of an English merchant. 
He was born at Waverley September 13, 1799. His life, therefore, began 
with the last century. He received his education not in any of the large 
public schools but at a small private school. His father's business was an 
extensive one and had an important branch at St. Petersburg. Young 
Thomson was early taken from school and sent to that wealthy and 
fashionable city to begin a business career. While in St. Petersburg, on this 
his first visit, although a lad of only sixteen, he continued to improve his 
mind and to mingle freely with the society life of the city. However, after 
two years' residence his health broke down and he was obliged to return to 
his native land. He made but a brief sojourn in England and then visited 
302 



LORD SYDENHAM. 303 

the continent where he spent nearly a year in the pleasure and health resorts 
of Italy, Switzerland and France. The rest and change of climate completely 
restored him to health and he returned to London to begin once more a 
mercantile life. 

Although he had been taken from school at the early age of sixteen he 
had an excellent equipment for the battle of life. He had been ever a close 
reader and during his residence in Russia, Germany, Italy and France had 
set himself assiduously to the study of the languages of these countries and 
spoke them with great fluency. He felt that he was fitted for something 
higher than a counting-house and, anxious to put his fine linguistic powers 
to use, sought employment on some foreign embassy. However, this was not 
to be and he remained in London at his desk for several years. His business 
abilities were recognized in the house and he was given a partnership, and 
was once more sent to St. Petersburg. He spent nearly two years in the land 
of the Czar and while there journeyed much through the country, visiting the 
principal points of trade, and, in his observations in the journal which he kept, 
showed a fine knowledge of men and affairs. He left Russia in 1824 and 
before returning to London spent some months in Vienna and Paris. His 
application to business, his study of books, his contact with society, his visits 
to the great centres of art and learning all went to the shaping of his 
character, and when he returned to London in 1824 after the death of his 
mother, he was recognized as one of the keenest-sighted and most polished of 
the young men of his time. 

In the year 1825, he was carried away by mining speculations that were 
taking place in America, and, like many another Englishman then and since, 
lost heavily through his over-confidence in the promoters of schemes in the 
New World. However, his losses do not seem to have effected him much, 
and that same year he became interested in the great questions that Mr. 
Huskisson and other Reformers were bringing to the front. His study of and 
interest in these questions brought him into contact with such men as Mr. 
Mill, Mr. Hume, Mr. Warburton and Mr. Bentham. These men did not a 
little to form his niind on economic and social questions. They and other 
Liberals were attracted by his wisdom, his brilliancy as a speaker and his 



304 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

extensive knowledge of the great trade questions of his time. He was 
asked by them to become a candidate for the borough of Dover; and 
having a genuine enthusiasm for reform, decided to stand for the House of 
Commons. This step was not approved of by the firm of Thomson & Sons, 
who had little sympathy with the agitation of the Liberals. His father and 
eldest brother endeavored to persuade him to give up his intention of 
standing for Dover. It was, they maintained, contrary to the interests of 
their business. They even went so far as to threaten a dissolution ot 
partnership, but Poulett Thomson heeded not their prayers or threats, but 
went on with the contest and won after a hard fight. It is interesting to note, 
in this age when political corruption is so much talked about, that the 
expenses of this election came to no less than £3,000. 

He soon became a very active member of the House, and voted and 
spoke on many of the measures that were introduced by his Reform fellow 
members. When questions regarding England's foreign trade came up he 
spoke with power and knowledge, and through his wide experience on the 
continent and in business, was able to throw many lights on the questions 
that held the attention of the House. Mr. Huskisson admiringly said of 
him after one of his speeches that " he showed an extraordinary degree of 
acuteness and knowledge in respect to the commerce and navigation of the 
country." He was a consistent Reformer, and spoke in favor of vote by 
ballot, changing of the navigation laws, greater civil and religious liberty for 
his countrymen, and introduced a bill for the repeal of the usury laws. He 
was a tower of strength to Mr. Huskisson, who was beginning his battle for 
free trade. A speech delivered by him in the early stages of this struggle 
was one of the ablest ever heard in the House of Commons on the question. 
In the course of this speech he said : " I am no rash theorist, — I am 
not desirous of carrying a favorite principle into operation at the 
expense of existing interests; but I maintain that your only course is a 
gradual, a progressive, but a steady approach to a free system ; and 1 
maintain, without fear of contradiction, that the very essence of manufacturing 
and commercial industry, is freedom from legislative interference and legis- 
lative protection. Attempt to assist its course by protective enactments, by 



LORD SYDENHAM. 807 

fosterinjT care, — you arrest its progress, you destroy its vigour. Unbind the 
shackles in wliich your unwise tenderness has confined it — permit it to talce 
unrestrained its own course, — expose it to the wholesome breezes of 
competition, you give it new life, you restore its former vigour. Industry 
had been well likened, in my opinion, to the hardy alpine plant : aelf-sown 
on the mountain side, exposed to the inclemency of the seasons, it gathers 
strength in its struggles for existence, it shoots forth in vigour and in beauty. 
Transplanted to the rich soil of the parterre, — tended by the fostering hand 
of the gardener, — nursed in the artificial atmosphere of the forcing-glass, it 
grows sickly and enervated, — its shoots are vigourless, its flowers inodorous. 
In one single word lies the soul of industry — competition." 

Before he was thirty years old Mr. Thomson was a sufferer from gout, 
and, in 1829, went to Paris for his health. While in this city he mingled 
freely with the leaders in diplomacy and politics, and gained fine diplomatic 
skill. After the death of Mr. Huskisson he was appointed, in Earl Grey't 
Administration, Vice-President of the Board of Trade with the Treasurershij, 
of the Navy. He now had to devote all his energies to his country, and 
dissolved partnership in the business firm of which up to this time he had 
been an active member. 

In the first great discussion on the Reform Bill he was one of the 
strongest men. He continued to be recognized as a leader in his party, and 
in 1831 went to Paris in the interests of England to begin negotiations for a 
new commercial treaty. He proved himself an able diplomat, and hi.s 
knowledge of the French character and the French language, and hii own 
polish and suavity made his mission successful, and English trade 
benefited largely by his work. He took a most active interest in th« 
industries of his country and visited all the great manufacturing districts 
in England and Scotland. At the election of 1832 he was returned 
for both Dover and Manchester, although he put forth no effort to win the 
latter seat. He naturally chose Manchester, as it was the most important 
manufacturing centre in the kingdom. Between the years 1832 and 1838 



308 ]Uiii,i)i:i;s ok canada. 

he was influential in reducing the duties on nearly four hundred articles. 
In 1834 his abilities were to receive further recognition, and he was given 
the position of President of the Board of Trade. 

When the Canadian question, due to the Rebellion of 1837, began to 
occupy a large place in the minds of English statesmen, Mr. Thomson took 
great interest in the situation. In 1839, when Lord Durham's Report was 
occupying the attention of the House, he remarked to another friend with 
regard to Canada : " Lord A. said he thought Canada ' the finest field of 
exertion for anyone as offering the greatest power for doing the greatest good 
to one's fellow creatures.' I agree with him." 

Towards the close of this year he had the choice between the 
Chancellorship of the Exchequer and the government of Canada. He knew 
tlio difficulties in the New World, but he had confidence in himself, and 
believed that he was able to surmount them. Lord Durham's able Report 
was before him, besides he was an intimate friend of Lord Durham, and Mr. 
Charles BuUer, and their wise counsel greatly helped him in forming a 
correct estimate of the obstacles he would have to overcome in Canada. 
Alter carefully considering the matter from all sides he accepted the position 
of Governor-General of the British Provinces in North America. On 
September 13, 1839, he sailed for Quebec, which he reached after a stormy 
voyage of thirty-three days. The confidence he had in his own strength is 
shown in the following words written during his voyage to Canada. 

"I have thought a good deal within the last few days of my position; 
and upon the whole I think I have done right, both on public and. on 
personal grounds. I have a better chance of settling things in Canada than 
anyone they could have found to go ; and if I had not taken it then, as I 
could not well have got out of the government, I should have shared in the 
disgrace next session. It is a great field, too, if I bring about the 
union, and stay for a year to meet the United Assembly and set them 
to work." 

When he landed at Quebec he found that the people on the whole were 
friendly disposed towards him. He made a short sojourn in Quebec and 
then proceeded to Montreal, where the seat of government was now fixed. 



LORD SYDENHAM. 309 

Mr. Thomson at onoe went to work to bring about a Union of the two 
Provinces of Canada. He called together a special council, but it waa 
composed of the men appointed by his predecessor, and he took care to add 
no new members. He was known to be a Reformer. His political record 
was an open book to the men of Upper Canada, and not a few in Toronto 
felt a strong antipathy to him. However, he patiently bided his time, 
believing that in the end he would bring all classes to his way of thinking. 
He had no easy task before him, but he went manfully to his work and 
handled the rebel French and the rebel British and the "Family Compact" 
party with such wisdom that on the last day of the year he was able to write 
thus : — 

" I have done my business. The Union is carried triumphantly through 
the Legislature of both Provinces. And it now only remains for Parliament 
to do its duty and pass the Bill, which I shall send home. It had not been 
without trouble and a prodigious deal of management, in which my House 
of Commons tactics stood me in good stead, for I wanted above all things to 
avoid a dissolution. My ministers vote against me, so I govern through the 
opposition, who are truly ' Her Majesty's.' . . . It is something to have 
concluded my business before I get an answer to my announcement of my 
arrival in the country. Just two months from the day of my landing in 
Quebec the Assembly sent me their final address, completing the chain of 
assents which I required." 

He had now before him, what he considered, a much more difficult 
question to settle, the Clergy Reserves. The battle over this matter had been 
waged bitterly for several decades, and the question had assumed an 
importance that was threatening the life of the colony. Mr. Thomson 
believed it to be " the root of all the troubles of the Province, the cause of 
the Rebellion — the never-failing watch-word of the hustings, the perpetual 
source of discord, strife and hatred." He had confidence that he could settle 
this matter, too. The bill he brought in on the Clergy Reserves question 
passed the Assembly, but was to undergo much change before it finally 
became law. When the Bill was being dealt with by the Legislative Council 
he wrote with regard to it : " If it is really passed it is the greatest work 



310 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

that ever has been done in this country, and will be of more solid advantage 
to it than all the loans and all the troops you can make or send. It is worth 
ten Unions and was ten times as difficult." 

In dealing with both the question of the Union and the Clergy Reserves 
question much of his success was due to his holding himself absolutely aloof 
from either party. He saw that the previous governors had failed because 
" they threw themselves into the hands of one party or the other and became 
their slave." He, on the other hand, determined to yield to neither of them. 
He "took the moderate from both sides — rejected the extremes — and 
governed" as he thought right. He was satisfied that the mass of the 
people were moderate in their demands and attached to British Institutions ; 
he believed that " they had been oppressed by a miserable little oligarchy on 
the one hand and excited by a few factious demagogues on the other." He 
expected greater difficulties in settling matters in Lower Canada, but when 
he turned his undivided attention to affairs in that Province he showed 
himself desirous to protect the French Canadians in a fair share of political 
power, and to maintain their equality with their fellow subjects, and the 
French were not long in recognizing that in him they had a genuine friend. 

His good work received the approval of the Queen, and in 1840 he was 
raised to the peerage with the title of Baron Sydenham of Sydenham in 
Toronto and Kent. During this year he visited many parts of the country, 
and was greatly impressed with the possibilities of its future. He was 
everywhere enthusiastically received, and his journey in both Upper and 
Lower Canada was, to use his own words, a triumph — a series of ovations. 

On February 6, a proclamation was issued declaring the re-union oi 
Upper and Lower Canada, and on February 10, Lord Sydenham officially 
proclaimed the Union of the Provinces. Kingston was made the capital of 
Canada, and Messrs. Sullivan, Dunn, Odgen, Draper, Baldwin, Day, Daly, 
and Harrison were chosen for the first Council. 

It looked for a time as if Lord Sydenham would never preside over the 
United Canadian Parliament. He was in ill-health, and so severe were 
several of the attacks of gout that his life was despaired of; indeed, he had 
almost given up all hope of ever again seeing the other side of the Atlantic, 



LORD SYDENHAM. 31 1 

However, he had the gratification of meeting his parliament, and in his 
speech from the throne spoke hopefully of the future. On several questions 
which he introduced he had a stiff fight, but with the exception of one or two 
minor points, was in every case successful, and saw the Union " irrevocably 
established and the new government thoroughly organized." 

During the summer months he resided at Alwington House, on the 
lake shore, near Kingston, and the quiet of the spot and the healthy lake 
breezes gave him new strength. He liked his work and would willingly 
have remained in Canada, but he knew he had not long to live. The 
sweetest music to his ears would be the guns pealing from ther rock of Quebec 
wishing him a safe journey to the motherland. He longed for the end of the 
session, and wrote hopefully to his friends of seeing them again. He was 
confident that nothing could break the Union. " Canada," he said, " must 
henceforth go on well unless it is most terribly mismanaged ; " and he gave 
wise advice as to the kind of successor who should be sent out to take 
his place. 

" What I have seen, however," he wrote early in the session, " and had 
to do in the course of the last three weeks, strengthens my opinion of the 
absolute necessity of your sending out as my successor someone with House 
of Commons and Ministerial habits — ^a person who will not shrink from 
work, and who will govern, as I do, himself. Such a man — not a soldier, but 
a statesman — will find no diflaculties in his path that he cannot easily 
surmount; for everything will he in grooves running of itself, and only 
requiring general direction." 

His health was so far recovered by September as to enable him to take 
breezy rides along the beautiful lake shore. On the 4th of September, as he 
was cantering up a hill near Alwington House, without any thought of 
danger, his horse stumbled, threw him and fell on him, breaking the large 
bone of his leg. He was carried to his home and at first the doctors gave 
hopes of his recovery, but his constitution was so undermined by gout, which 
now, as he said, coward-like stepped in to add to his sufi'erings. Still he 
expected to be confined to his bed for not more than three or four weeks, and 
expressed hopes of sailing for England in the autumn. 



812 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

He did not permit the intense pain he was enduring to interfere with 
his conduct of the business of the country. The questions before the 
Legislature occupied his mind, and the officers of the goyernment and 
leading members of both Houses visited him, and he gave them advice and 
discussed public matters with them. 

On the 11th of September he was so hopeful of an early recovery that he 
wrote to Lord Falkland, Governor of Nova Scotia, in a cheerful vein 
requesting to have the frigate " Pique " sent to Quebec to b© in readineas to 
carry him to England as soon as he was strong enough to bef^in the journey. 
There is much of pathos in his words : " She brought me out, and I should 
like to go home in her." 

He continued to make final preparations for leaving Canada with a full 
sense of having done well the work he was sent from England to do. He 
was able to write to Lord John Russell in the following terms : 

" You will have seen that I was determined to do all my business before 
coming away ; and a pretty session it will be. Every measure will have 
been triumphantly carried. Though I could not get the Bank through, it 
must succeed another year. The House of Assembly wished to defer it for 
the session ; but in the meantime they have taxed the issues of private 
banks, which will insure its passing. My successor, therefore, will have 
little of legislation even left for him." 

The state of his health was now more critical, and the pain he was 
suffering became more intense, but he continued to examine Bills sent up to 
him by the Legislature, and busied himself preparing the speech with whi-ch 
he intended to close the session. He spent Friday, September 17, in giving 
the final touches to his address. But even while he was working on it his 
physicians and friends realized that he had only a few days, at the outside, 
to live. They had given up all hope of his recovery, but he was still 
hopeful. However, on the 18th of the month he, too, saw that he was dying, 
but even on that day had the public affairs of Canada at heari He suffered 
intense pain, but no complaining word came from his lips, and on Sunday, 
the 19th, this Ufe, so short, yet so full of good work for England and her 
greatest colony, ended. 



LOKD SVDE^■HAM. o-f o 



ffis death was deeply lamented in Canada. His friends, and even hia 
enemies, recognized that he was the ablest man yet sent from England to 
govern this country.. He had been cut oflf when his work for Briti.^i North 
America was but begun. He was only forty-two years old when he died, 
and yet what a splendid record he had left behind 1 He had done as much 
as any man of his time to pave the way for Enghsh free trade, and he had 
shown England how a statesman should deal with the colonies. His labors 
in Canada brought cahn after turmoil and rebellion, and his death on the 
field of his labors set a seal to his work. 



CHAPTER XX 

SIR JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON. 
By J. Castei,!, Hopkins. 

Sir John Beverley Robinson a Descendant of an Old Yorkshire Family — His Father a Veteran 
of the Revolutionary War — Born at Berthier, Quebec, July 26, 1791 — Educated By John 
Strachan — Begins the Study of Law — Appointed Attorney- General of Upper Canada — A 
Soldier of the War of 1812 — First Representative of the Town of York in the Assembly — 
Sent to England on an Important Mission — The Imperial Government Offers him the 
Position of Chief-Justice of the Island of Mauritius — Appointed Chief-Justice of Upper 
Canada — Favors the Clergy Reserves and Opposes Responsible Government — Volunteers 
for the Defence of Toronto in the Rebellion of 1837 — Declines the Honor of Knighthood — 
Made a Companion of the Bath in 1850 — Created a Baron of the United Kingdom in 1854 
— Received the Degree of D. C. L. from the University of Oxford— His Death January 31 
1863 — For Upwards of half a Century a Foremost Figure in Upper Canada. 

^HE Hon. Sir John Beverley Robinson, Bart., C. B., D. C. L., was a 

descendant of an old Yorkshire family which had a lineage running 

back to the time of Henry VII. His father was Christopher 

Robinson, who during the Revolutionary war, received a commission in the 

famous " Queen's Rangers" under Colonel Simcoe, afterwards the first governor 

of Upper Canada. 

He was born at Berthier, Quebec, July 26, 1791, and when seven years 
of age removed with his parents to York, the then Provincial capital. Some 
two years later he was sent to Kingston to the school of the afterwards 
celebrated Bishop Strachan. Being a very bright and attractive boy, the 
great educator became very fond of him and proud of his proficiency. It 
was, therefore, quite natural that the opinions of the youth should be 
moulded by the learned doctor, and it was during this early formative period 
that young Robinson's political convictions, which he ever after conscien- 
tiously held, were formed. During his entire political career, indeed, he was 
very susceptible to the powerful influence of his early teacher. When about 
314 



SIR JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON. 817 

sixteen he began the study of law, at which he made such rapid progress 
and displayed such unusual'legal knowledge, that when only twenty-one years of 
age he was made Attorney-General of Upper Canada. In order to accept this 
high office he was called to the Bar by a special action of the Court, and this 
was duly confirmed by an act of the Legislature. 

At this time he also took up arms in defence of his country, and served 
during the war of 1812. Throughout the campaign he was conspicuous for 
courage and indifference to danger. He was with Brock on his western 
expedition, and took part in the surrender of Detroit. He was a member of 
the guard placed over the American General, Hull ; took part in the battle at 
Queenston Heights, and was not far from General Brock when he fell. 
Lieutenant E-obinson was foremost in the last desperate charge of the men of 
Lincoln and the York Volunteers. He was greatly admired by the troops 
for his military dash and bravery. 

During his terms as Attorney-General — Dec. 3, 1812, to Jan. 6, 1815, 
and Feb. 18, 1818, to July, 1829 — it devolved upon him to prosecute in the 
celebrated case of Robert Gourlay. In connection with this trial, grave 
charges were made against him by political opponents of tampering with 
justice, but there was never any ground for such an accusation. 

In 1821, Mr. Robinson became the first representative of the town of York 
in the House of Assembly, and was at once the leader and mouthpiece of the 
Tory party. He was a ready and finished speaker, and having himself well 
under control, made comparatively few personal enemies. He possessed a 
commanding presence and the bearing of an English gentleman of the old 
school. In 1822 he successfully accomplished an important mission to Great 
Britain regarding the settlement of certain differences which had arisen 
between Upper and Lower Canada over the collection of custom duties at 
Montreal, and for this he received a vote of thanks from both Houses of the 
Legislature. 

About this time the Imperial government offered to make him Chief 
Justice of the Island of Mauritius, an honor which he declined, although the 
office would have yielded several thousand pounds per annum. In 1829 he 
declined the office of C'liief Justice of Upper Canada, but in 1830 he accepted 



318 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

the position. As Chief Justice he was president of the Executive Council, 
and was also Speaker of the Upper House from 1828 to 1840. In debates his 
conservative cast of mind was generally apparent. He was ever in favor of 
maintaining the Clergy Reserves, and always opposed to responsible 
government as understood in those days. 

In the Rebellion of 1837 he volunteered for the defence of Toronto 
against the rebels, and it was he who was obliged as Chief Justice to 
pronounce sentence of death on Peter Matthews and Samuel Lount. 

While in England in 1839, he declined the honour of Knighthood, and 
at the union of the provinces in 1841, shortly after his return, his political 
life may be said to have terminated. For nearly a quarter of a century after 
this he continued to discharge the duties of Chief Justice in a way which 
brought him universal respect. His learning, acumen and stainless integrity 
were proverbial. His industry was as marked as his learning, and his 
judgments were very rarely at fault. In 1850 Chief Justice Robinson was made 
a Companion of the Bath. Four years later he was created a Baronet of the 
United Kingdom, and in 1856 received from the University of Oxford the 
honorary degree of D. C. L. 

In 1862 he retired from the position of Chief Justice and accepted the 
less arduous one of President of the Court of Appeal. In January, 1863, he 
presided in this capacity for the last time, as a few days after he was seized 
by an acute illness and expired on the 31st of that month. His remains 
were laid to rest in St. James' Cemetery, Toronto. 

For upwards of half a century he had held a foremost position in the 
history of the Province. Success not only came to him early in life, but 
remained with him. Throughout his entire career, whether as a boy at 
school, a student at law, a soldier on the battlefield, a leader in parliament, 
or as Chief Justice of the Province, he honoured each position and brought 
to the discbarge of his duty that continued industry, nobility of charactei 
and splendid talent which ever distinguished his public and private Ufe, and 
kept for him a high position amongst his fellow-men. 



CHAPTER XXT. 

LORD ELGIN. 

A Critical Period in Canadian History — The Two Races in Canada Make Government Difficult — 
The War of 1837 Intensifies the Situation — Lord Elgin a Wise Ruler — His Birth and 
Descent — His Education — A Distinguished Scholar — Enters Lincoln's Inn — Member for 
Southampton — Appointed Governor of Jamaica — Ameliorates the Moral and Social 
Condition of the Negroes — His Return to England — Appointed Governor-General of British 
North America — Finds the French and the English in Canada in Bitter Antipathy to Each 
Other — The Country in a Wretched Financial Condition — The Ravages Made by "Ship- 
Fever" — Canadians Indignant at England for Sending Pauper Emigrants to Canada — 
Makes an Extensive Trip Through Canada — Loyalists of Upper Canada Dissatisfied 
with Lord Elgin's Attitude — The Rebellion Losses Bill — The Tories of Montreal Create 
Riots on Passage of the Bill — Lord Elgin Tenders His Resignation to the Home 
Government — His Course in Canada Approved of by the English Government — Decides to 
Remove Seat of Government from Montreal — Once More Visits Upper Canada — The 
French Drawn Toward England by His Just Rule — The "Tories" Issue Annexation 
Manifestoes — Lord Elgin Endeavors to Establish Reciprocity with the United States — 
Visits the United States — Concludes a Reciprocity Treaty — Opposed to Militarism — 
His Immigration Policy — His Farewell to Canada — His Attitude on the Crimean War — 
The " Arrow " Affair — Sent to China by the British Government — His Wise Actional 
Time of Indian Mutiny — In Calcutta — His Negotiations with the Chinese — On His Return 
to England Offered the Office of Postmaster-General by Lord Palmerston — Fresh Troubles 
Break Out in China — Lord Elgin Returns to the East with a Strong Force — Compels the 
Chinese Authorities to Ratify the Treaty of Tientsin — His Work Appreciated in England — 
Appointed Viceroy of India — Visits the Principal Cities of India — Seized With a Fatal 
Illness — His Death — Dean Stanley's Tribute to His Memory — A Great Empire Builder. 

CANADA, like every other young country of modern times, has had 
several decidedly critical periods in her history, but none is of more 
importance than that which occurred almost immediately after the 
Rebellion of 1837. 

Lord Durham by his wise report to the Home government had suggested 
a way out of the difficulties threatening Canada, but likewise pointed out 
that the greatest of all difficulties was not a political one, but was racial. The 
great obstacle to Canadian development was the two distinct races, the French 
and the British, who in ideas, laws and in language, opposed each other. 

319 



320 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

The War of 1837 had intensified this mutual antipathy and it looked for a 
time, within a decade of the close of the struggle, as if a still bloodier strife 
would break out. Fortunately for the country, at the critical moment the 
destiny of Canada was in the hands of an astute and experienced ruler who 
grasped the situation and fearlessly wrought in the interests of right. 

This distinguished governor was James, eighth Earl of Elgin, and 
twelfth Earl of Kincardine. He was born in London on July 20, 1811, and 
was a descendant of the great house of Robert, the Bruce. He was of a 
family of diplomats ; his father had been ambassador to Constantinople and had 
won renown through his connection with the celebrated " Elgin Marbles." The 
future Governor of Canada received his preliminary education at the hands of a 
private tutor, Mr. Fergus Jardine, but at the age of fourteen was sent to Eton, 
and afterward to Christ Church, Oxford, where he was associated with some 
of the most brilliant minds of the century — among them Lord Canning, Lord 
Dalhousie and Mr. Gladstone, and he was not the least in the group. It was an 
age when oratory counted for much, and on several occasions at the Union 
Club he made speeches, which, it has been said, not even Mr. Gladstone 
could have equalled. He was, however, essentially a student and lived much 
in his books. He took such a distinguished place in his classes that when a 
studentship in the gift of Dr. Bull of Christ Church, Oxford, fell vacant, it 
was awarded to him for his excellent deportment, diligence, and right- 
mindedness. These words might have been applied to him in any stage of 
his brilliant career. He was sent to Jamaica, to Canada, to China and to 
India, largely on account of his diligence and right-mindedness. 

He over-worked himself at college and was forced to limit his studies 
almost exclusively to the classics. However, he cultivated philosophy and to 
the end of his life his mind had a serious, philosophical and religious bent, 
although he never was what could be called an abstract thinker. 

He entered Lincoln's Inn but seems to have done so with the intention 
of preparing himself for politics rather than law, and it was not until 1810 
that his true career began. In that year by the death of his half-brother 
George, Lord Bruce, he became heir to the earldom. In the following year 
he married Elizabeth Mary, daughter of M. C. L. Cummings Bruce ; and in 



LOKD ELGIN. 821 

the general election of the same year he stood for the borough of 
Southampton and was returned to Parliament at the head of the poll. 

As was expected by those who knew him best at Oxford, he at once 
came to the front. His first opportunity was in a speech he made in 
seconding the amendment to the Address. This speech proclaimed him one 
of the ablest minds in the House of Commons, but his career in the Lower 
House was brought to a sudden termination by the death of his father and 
his own elevation to the earldom. As a result of this he took his seat in the 
House of Lords, and it seemed as if England was to lose one of her best and 
most promising statesmen; but the Empire is vast, and needs all kinds of 
minds. There was work for Elgin in the "West and in the East which was 
quite as important as any he could have done in the homeland. 

Scarcely had he entered the House of Lords before the Governorship of 
Jamaica became vacant. The island needed a man at the head of it who 
was possessed of true statesmanship, and Lord Elgin was selected for the 
position. In April, 1842, he sailed for Jamaica with his young wife. On 
the voyage out he had the misfortune to suffer shipwreck. All the 
passengers were saved, but Lady Elgin received such a severe shock that she 
never completely recovered from it, and died in the summer of the following 
year. 

As Governor of Jamaica, Lord Elgin's aim was to rule constitutionally, 
to win the good-will of the inhabitants, and to promote the interests of all 
ranks of society on the island. He saw that the negroes were sunk in moral 
and social degradation, and, in season and out of season, he sought to 
ameliorate their condition. They were scarcely fit for freedom, and the only 
way they could be made so, he believed, was by education. The planters, 
very naturally, had an antipathy to expending money on educating such 
menials as the colored races under their rule. Lord Elgin endeavored to 
make the planters realize that an educated negro was worth much more than 
an illiterate one, and that money spent on education would be a profitable 
investment. 

His sojourn in the island was comparatively short, but he left a deep 
impress upon it, and due to his residence in Jamaica the whole population 
18 



322 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

was elevated socially and morally and religiously. But his life was a sad 
one ; he could never shake off the melancholy caused by the death of hia 
wife, and, excepting when his duties called him torth, he lived in retirement 
with his sister and his brother, Robert Bruce, who acted as his private 
secretary. After three years in Jamaica he desired to return to the green 
fields of England and the pleasant companionship of his English friends, and 
asked to be relieved. However, he was needed a little longer, and at the 
request of the government remained in Jamaica until the spring of 1846. 

Lord Grey, Secretary for the Colonies, made an effort to have him retained 
in Jamaica, but failed ; recognizing his great ability he had him appointed, 
shortly after his return to England, to the important position of Governor- 
General of British North America, Canada was at this time attracting 
considerable attention in England. It was a post of trust requiring great 
energy and good statemanship ; just the kind of a country a strong man 
would like to rule in, and Lord Elgin accepted the position. On November 
7, 1846, he married Lady Mary Louisa Lambton, daughter of the late Earl of 
Durham who had done so much to give Canada a strong government. 

Within two months of his marriage he sailed for America. He left his 
wife in England for the time being, no doubt, dreading to take her in the 
winter season to the hardships of the Canadian climate. Canada at that time 
was, as indeed it is to-day, to nearly every Englishman a land of arctic-like 
severity. After an unusually storm}'- passage his vessel reached Boston, and 
he set out at once lor the seat of government at Montreal, where he arrived on 
January 29. He was scarcely in the city before he realized that he had in 
hand a much more difiicut task than the governing of such a colony as 
Jamaica. Here he found two races in bitter antipathy to each other, the 
English hating, despising the French, and the French looking upon the 
English as conquerors and would-be tyrants. At the same time to the south 
was the United States, a prosperous nation rapidly becoming a great power. 
Racial and political dissatisfaction in Canada turned the eyes of many 
Canadians towards the flesh-pots of the republic to their south. There were 
dissensions within the land and many of the inhabitants were disloyal or 



LORD ELGIN. 828 

apparently ready to become so. Canadian representative institutions were 
still in their infancy and it seemed to many that they were a failure. 

The country was in a wretched financial condition. Free-trade which 
had lately been adopted in England had ruined many of the business men 
and it was said that three-fourths of those engaged in commercial enterprises 
were bankrupts. As is ever the case, this commercial depression caused 
much political discontent. Again ^ the famine in Ireland was seriously 
affecting Canadian affairs. To relieve the unfortunate situation in that 
unhappy island thousands of emigrants were sent to Canada. The unsanitary 
conditions under which they came to this country caused an outbreak of 
" ship-fever," and the unfortunate people died by hundreds. The Irish who 
came into the country were in abject poverty and became burdens to the 
communities in which they settled. This was not the worst phase of the 
situation, the plague they brought with them spread throughout Canada and 
many of the inhabitants fell a prey to it. Very naturally the Canadians 
resented the action of England in sending these pauper emigrants to this 
country. At the same time Metcalfe's*^Iinistry had become greatly weakened ; 
they saw that they could hold office for but a few brief months and were 
prepared to bitterly oppose any governor-general who would even be just to 
the Reform party. 

When Lord Elgin landed in the country he very soon grasped the 
situation. He saw the mistake Metcalfe had made in identifying himself 
with the Tory party, and he was determined to hold aloof from all parties 
and to rule constitutionally, no matter what it might cost him. He 
recognized, as had Lord Durham, that the great cause of lack of unity in 
Canada was the race difficulty. The French looked upon the English as 
their conquerors, and to some extent their oppressors, and he resolved to do 
all in his power to win them to contentment under British rule. 

In the autumn of 1847, he made an extended trip through Upper 
Canada and was much delighted with the rich country and the sturdy 
inhabitants. He saw the possibilities of what is now Ontario and prophesied 
for the region along the lakes a great future. 



824 



BUILDERS OF CANADA, 



At the close of 1847 the Canadian parliament dissolved and in 1848 
Lord Metcalfe's Ministry found itself in a decided minority. In the new 
government which was formed the French Canadians were the chief element 
and this added not a little to the discontent of the Loyalists of Upper Canada, 
The situation in the country had made them feel bitterly, and now the loss of 
office added intensity to their hatred of what they deemed the Rebel party. 
But Lord Elgin w^as not displeased with the French predominancy, and saw 
in the situation an opportunity to reconcile the inhabitants of Quebec to 
British rule. When parHament met in January, 1848, he had the tact to 
address it in both French and English. The opposition seized the occasion to 
cry down a governor-general who would so far cater to the French as to 
address them in their own language. Lord Elgin went further than this, he 
did all in his power to have the restrictions on the use of the French language 
removed and made efforts to make it easy for the habitants to acquire Crown 
lands. As a result of his action towards the French, long before the 
Rebellion Losses Bill came to stir the country to its depths, he was cordially 
hated by the Loyalist party. 

During the War of 1837 and 1838 much property had been destroyed in 
both Upper and Lower Canada. The Loyalists of Upper Canada felt that 
they alone should be indemnified, but when the Reform party of Lower 
Canada attained power they brought in a bill to provide for losses sustained 
in Lower Canada during the Rebellion. When thjs bill was first mentioned 
it raised a storm of indignation among the Loyalists. They looked upon it 
as a measure intended to recompense rebels. Lord Elgin, on the other hand, 
saw in it nothing but justice, and, while he was not out-spoken in the matter, 
it was generally understood that it would have his support. The Tories 
addressed petitions to Lord Elgin praying, that the parliament introducing it 
might be dissolved or that if they did succeed in passing the bill it should be 
reserved for the Royal sanction. Lord Elgin courteously received these 
petitions, but when the bill passed the Assembly by forty-seven votes to 
eighteen, and especially when there was a majority of the members of Upper 
Canada in favor of it. he saw no other course as a constitutional ruler than to 














i«^ 







THE HON. GEORGE BROWN 



IXJKD ELGIN. 5JJ7 

give it his sanction, and so, on April 25, 1849, he gave the Royal assent to the 

Rebellion Losses Bill. 

When he left the House of Parliament he was cheered and hooted, and, 
as he drove through the streets, the "respectable Tories" of Montreal pelted 
his carriage with all kinds of missiles. They called an open-air meeting at 
which inflammatory speeches were made, and the excited mob rushed to the 
Parliament House, broke the windows and burned the building to the ground, 
destroying a valuable library that was a distinct loss to the country. For 
several days the rioting continued, but Lord Elgin acted with great judgment, 
restraining the hand of the government and preventing bloodshed. The 
aouse of Assembly voted an address to the Governor-General expressing 
^heir abhorrence of these riots. On April 30, Lord Elgin set out from 
"Monklands" for the Government House to receive the address and was 
escorted into the city by a troop of volunteers, but on the way his carriage 
was stoned and he was forced to return to his country residence. Rioting 
continued, and for a time the lives of the members of the government and the 
Kfe of the Governor-General himself were in danger. The situation was most 
painful to Lord Elgin, but he in no way swerved from his position on the 
RebelHon Losses Bill. However, in order to prevent a collision between 
the French and English in Montreal, he remained for several weeks at 
"Monklands." The Tory papers of Montreal had the lack of generosity 
to state that his action was due to cowardice. 

The situation in Canada was such that he felt it his duty to tender his 
resignation to the Home government, but he was told " that to retire from 
the high office which the Queen had been pleased to entrust to you, and 
which from the value she puts upon your services it is her most anxious wish 
that you should retain it, should be out of the question." While he had the 
support of the Home government he was not without friends among the 
the English-speaking people of Canada, and many addresses of approval were 
sent to him; but the Montreal incendiaries were not to be appeased and rebellion 
broke out again in August. Lord Elgin and the government now saw how 
impossible it would be to retain the seat of government at Montreal, and so it 
^as decided to remove it from the city. On account of the race difficulty and 



328 BUILDERS OP CANADA. 

the long distances in the country it was decided thai alternate meetings should 
b© held at Quebec and Toronto. Under the circumstances it was concluded 
to hold the first meeting in Toronto ; otherwise the cry of French rule would 
have been raised throughout Canada. 

Lord Elgin once more visited Upper Canada in order to get to know the 
people better. He had expected to be received with considerable animosity, 
but, while a small minority showed their hatred of him for his attitude on the 
Rebellion Losses Bill, the great majority of the people gave him everywhere 
an enthusiastic welcome. 

His leniency with the mob was viewed in England with mixed feelings. 
The Home government was glad that bloodshed had been avoided but they 
could not understand his leniency. Of their attitude Elgin writes : " Lord 
Grey and Lord Russell both felt that either I was right or I was wrong. If 
the latter I ought to be recalled, if the former I ought to make the law 
respected." The people in the United States took an interest in the situation 
and some of the leading politicians said to Lord Elgin, with regard to this 
matter, " We thought that you were quite right, but we could not understand 
why you did not shoot them down." 

His generous treatment of the rioters had its reward, and although there 
is still a race difficulty in Canada Lord Elgin did more than any other of our 
governors-general to unify the country, to make of one mind and one heart 
the people of diverse blood in Canada. While he was in the country some 
seven hundred thousand French people became reconciled to English rule.. 
They saw that the representative of the Crown was eager to do them justice. 

The hard times and general discontent in Canada made many of the 
inhabitants of the country, and particularly the ultra-loyalists, look for relief 
towards the United States. Annexation was in the air and manifestoes were 
signed in many parts of the country in favor of it. Magistrates, Queen's 
counsels, militia officers and others holding positions under the Crowi. 
affixed their signatures to these manifestoes. Lord Elgin, although favorably 
disposed towards the American people, took decided steps to stop this 
movement. He had a circular addressed to all persons in any way connected 
with the government, whose names had been attached to these manifestoes, 



LORD ELGIN. 829 

and he resolved, with the advice of his Executive Council, that if their names 
had been attached with their own consent or if they refused to disavow the 
genuineness of them, to have them dismissed from office. While taking this 
course he recognized that there was cause for discontent. The restrictions on 
navigation greatly interfered with Canadian trade, and he had some of these 
restrictions removed for the benefit of Canada. He likewise set to work to 
have reciprocity established with the United States, and although it was some 
years before this was accomplished, he did not cease in his efforts till it was a 
fact. 

Although opposed to annexation he sought to win the good-will of the 
American people. He visited Buffalo, Boston, and Portland and through his 
speeches in these cities made a most favorable impression in the United 
States. When he went to Washington, in 1854, for the purpose of concluding 
a reciprocity treaty, he was most favorably received, and had little difficulty 
in consummating one which, while favorable to the United States, did 
much to bring prosperity to Canada. 

While at the head of Canadian affairs he strove to make the Home 
government realize the importance of her greatest colony, and aimed at making 
those in authority treat her with the respect due what was practically a great 
self-governing people. The following extract from a letter to Earl Grey, in 
which he refers to a speech on the colonies by Lord John Russell, well 
illustrates his point of view. 

" One thing is, however, indispensable," he wrote, " to the success of this 
or any other system of Colonial government, you must renounce the habit of 
telling the colonies that the Colonial is a provisional existence. You must 
allow them to believe that, without severing the bonds which unite them to 
Great Britain, they may attain the degree of perfection and of social and 
political development to which organized communities of free men have a 
right to aspire." 

While endeavoring to make Canada a truly self-respecting and self- 
governing country, he was opposed to militarism. The matter of defences 
came up for consideration, and in this connection he said, "only one 
absurdity could be greater, pardon me for saying so, than the absurdity 



330 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

of supposing that the British government will pay £200,000 for Canadian 
fortifications. It is the absurdity of supposing that Canadians will pay it 
themselves." He saw how useless defences would be against the rapidly growing 
giant to the south. For the prosperity of Canada and for her security the 
fewer guns, the fewer forts, and the fewer regular soldiers she had, would be 
the best safeguard, and there was no occasion for defending herself against, or 
making preparations to invade any other country. 

During Lord Elgin's term as governor-general a number of very 
important matters other than those referred to came up for consideration. 
Among these was the question of the secularization of the Clergy Reserves. 
This was contrary to his wishes, but when they were secularized he accepted 
the situation, and, as Colonial self-government had had a signal triumph, it 
even gave him pleasure. He early saw the absurdity of the mode of appointing 
members for the Upper House and favored making the Senate elective. He 
believed that a strong Legislative body returned by the same constituency as 
the House of Assembly under some differences with regard to time and mode 
of election would have a greater check on legislation than the Council had as 
now constituted. But the Senate remains, and the absurdity of it is quite as 
evident to all thinking men as it was in Elgin's day. 

The matter of immigration attracted his attention. There was a 
movement on foot to establish large parties of Irish immigrants in the sections 
of Western Canada. He was opposed to the scheme, believing that such a 
mode of peopling the country was not for the best interests of the colony or of 
the immigrants. " It is almost invariably found," he wrote, " that 
immigrants who thus isolate themselves, whatever their origin or associations, 
lag behind their neighbors, and I am inclined to think that, as a general rule, 
ill the case of communities whose social and political organization is as far 
advanced as that of the North American colonies, it is for the interest of all 
parties that new-comers instead of dwelling apart and bound together by ties, 
whether of sect or party, which united them in the country which they have 
left, should be disposed of as widely as possible among the population already 
estabUshed in that to which they have transferred themselves." 



LOBD ELGIN. * 331 

It would be well if the present government of Canada would take to heart 
Lord Elgin's words. It is very doubtful if settling down blocks of Russians, 
Galicians, Icelanders and Welshmen in isolated communities in the North 
West will be for the best development of the country. 

Although Lord Elgin had been so cordially hated by a large portion of 
the inhabitants of Canada in the first years of his rule he gradually won the 
esteem of nearly all Canadians, and when his work was done and he was 
about to leave the country crowds flocked to hear his farewell addresses. In 
Montreal, the scene of the riots, and the city in whose streets he had been 
stoned, the vast audience that listened to his parting words was, it was said, 
moved to tears. 

When he returned to England he sought a complete rest from oflScial 
labor. Shortly after his return the Crimean war broke out. Like many 
other Englishmen of that time he believed the war an unjust one and from 
his seat in the House of Lords spoke with vigor on the situation, — -just or 
unjust, England was at war and he was ready to stand by her. She had 
drawn the sword and he declared it should not be sheathed until the purpose 
for which it had been drawn was accomplished. 

At this time he did not identify himself with either of the great 
political parties. He had been so long in Canada that he was to some extent 
unfamiliar with the great questions of the day, and before he could get in 
touch with the changed aspect of the political situation, he was once more to 
be sent to the remote corners of the Empire to uphold the honor of England. 

Diflficulties arose between the Chinese and the British governments on 
account of the " Arrow " aflfair. A man of diplomatic skill and experience 
was needed for the situation, and Lord Elgin was chosen to go to China with 
a force sufficiently strong to compel the Chinese to recognize the demands of 
the British government. 

The expedition had only reached Ceylon, when Lord Elgin learned of the 
mutiny at Meerut. . He saw at once the danger threatening the Empire in 
India, and, on his own responsibility, dispatched the troops accompanying him 
to the scene of the conflict. This was one of the most magnificient acts of his 
brilliant career. Sir H. Ward wrote to him in this connection : " If I know 



332 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

ail}' thing of English public opinion this single act will place you higher in 
their estimation as a statesman than your whole past career, honorable and 
fortunate as it has been. For it is not every man who would venture to alter 
the destination of a force, upon the dispatch of which a parliament has been 
dissolved, and a government might have been superseded. It is not every 
man who would consign himself for many months to political inaction in 
order simply to serve the interests of his country. ... If India can be saved, 
it is to you that we should owe its redemption, for nothing short of the 
Chinese expedition could have supplied the means of holding our ground 
until reinforcements were received." 

Lord Elgin proceeded on his way to Hong Kong to await developments, 
with the hope of journeying in company with the French allies to the mouth 
of the Peiho before the setting in of winter. He saw, however, that delay 
was inevitable. The French ambassador. Baron Gros, had not yet arrived, 
and it would be many months before the troops he had sent to India could be 
restored to him. He, therefore, sailed for Calcutta in the ship-of-war 
" Shannon." He was received with enthusiasm by the inhabitants, and from 
the crew and guns of this ship the celebrated Naval Brigade, commanded by 
Sir William Peel, which was to be the chief factor in the relief of Lucknow 
and Cawnpore, was formed. But for the timely arrival of the " Shannon " 
with her heavy guns the Indian Mutiny might have had a different ending. 

Early, in September he once more proceeded to China on his mission. 
Canton was bombarded and fell an easy prey to the English, and Lord Elgin 
acted with great humanity towards the inhabitants. He assiduously wrought 
to bring the Chinese difficulty to a successful conclusion and at length with 
the help of the French captured the forts at the mouth of the Peiho, and the 
Emperor's capital was at his mercy. The Chinese were now ready to come to 
terms but while negotiations were impending he proceeded to Japan and 
brought about a favorable treaty with the Japanese government. He then 
returned to China and the treaty of Tientsin was finally signed. 

Lord Elgin during this trip to the East had not only done much to save 
India, to negotiate favorable treaties with both China and Japan, but had 
likewise studied China and its people with such thoroughness that for the 



LORD KLQIH. 838 

S^st time the country was truly known to the English ; and the policy of 
England in dealing with the Chinese for the future was largely shaped by 
Lord Elgin, while on this celebrated mission. He was completely successful 
and returned to England with a light heart. His services were appreciated 
by the government, and shortly after his arrival Lord Palmerston offered him 
the office of Postmaster-General in his new administration. This was not the 
only honor he received. He was elected Lord Rector of Glasgow University 
by the students, and the freedom of the city of London was conferred upon 
him. 

He was not long to enjoy a peaceful residence in England. Fresh 
trouble broke out in China, and, in 1860, he was once more journeying to the 
East. The Chinese government had refused to ratify the Treaty of Tientsin 
and a small English fleet attempted to pass up the Peiho. In the meantime 
the Chinese had strongly fortified the forts at the mouth of this 
river, and the fleet was repulsed with heavy loss. The British government 
determined to send out a large force to bring the Emperor to terms, and with 
this force went Lord Elgin. 

In a way the mission was distasteful to him. The sins of England in 
the past were largely to blame for the unpleasant situation that had arisen. 
In considering his mission in the light of the Indian Mutiny, he said : " Can 
I do nothing to prevent calling down God's curses for brutality inflicted on 
another feeble oriental race." While he was journeying to the East he 
prayed that the trouble might be ended before he reached China. However, 
when he arrived in the East he found the situation much as it had been 
reported before he left England. He had no fear for the ultimate results. 
The force at his command was sufficient to compel China to ratify the treaty. 
He at once went to work with vigor and in October his troops advanced on 
Pekin. The summer palace of the Emperor was captured by the cavalry and 
in order to save the city the Regent surrendered. The Emperor was 
responsible for the conflict that had arisen and for the murder of Europeans 
in China, and Lord Elgin determined to punish him for his misdeeds. He 
ordered the celebrated summer palace to be burned to the ground, but before 
doing so he issued a proclamation in Chinese to the effect "that any 



834 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

individual, however exalted, could not escape from the responsibility and 
punishment which must always follow acts of treachery and deceit, and that 
Yuen-Wing- Yuen was burned as a punishment inflicted on the Emperor for 
the violation of his word and the act of treachery to a flag of truce." Shortly 
after this Lord Elgin arranged with the Emperor's brother the ratification of 
the treaty of Tientsin. 

Towards the end of November the Chinese situation was settled and he 
was on a vessel homeward bound. He proceeded to England leisurely, 
visiting the Philippines, Java and Ceylon on his way. When he arrived in 
London he found, that as in the case of his former mission, his work had been 
thoroughly approved of by Her Majesty's government. Lord John Russell 
thus wrote with regard to his mission : " The convention which you concluded 
with the Prince of Kung on the 24th of October is entirely satisfactory to Her 
Majesty's government. It records the reparation made by the Emperor of 
China for his disregard of his treaty engagements ; it sets Her Majesty's 
government free from an implied engagement not to insist in all particulars 
on the fulfilment of those engagements ; it imposes upon China a fine, in the 
shape of an augmented rate of indemnity ; it afibrds an additional opening 
for British trade ; it places on a recognized footing the emigration of Chinese 
coolies, whose services are so important to Her Majesty's colonial possessions ; 
it relieves Her Majesty's colony of Hong Kong from a source of previous 
annoyance ; and it provides for bringing generally to the knowledge of the 
Chinese the engagements into which the Emperor has entered towards Great 
Britain. 

" These are all solid advantages ; and, coupled with the provisions of the 
treaty of Tientsin, they will, it may be hoped, place the relations between 
the two countries on a sound footing, and insure the continuation of peace for 
a long period to come." 

When Lord Elgin arrived in England in 1861 he was enthusiastically 
received. He was the most distinguished guest at the annual banquet of the 
Royal Academy in London and at the Mansion House. He was, however, to 
ha\e but a short sojourn in England. He had scarcely reached London 
before it was announced that Lord Canning was about to retire from the vice- 




!&i^^i'- 



f » i><i.kitpi|>«.ii^v)r<- , 




JAMES BRUCE, EARL OF ELGIN AND KINCARDINE 



LORD ELGIN. g37 

royalty of India. Lord Elgin's work in the East and his knowledge of the 
Eastern character, coupled with his experience as a ruler in Jamaica and 
Canada, fitted him, before all other Englishmen of his time, for the most 
important position in the Empire, and Lord Palmerston in the name of the 
Queen offered him the governorship of India. It was fitting that one who had 
done so much for India in the time ofher sore need should be sent to govern the 
teeming millions in that vast country. He accepted the offer with rejoicing 
and fear. He hoped to be able to do something to ameliorate the condition 
of the inhabitants of India, and at the same time to rule in such a way as to 
make up for the blunders of English rulers in the past. He knew he had no 
easy task before him and realized that he would have to give the best that 
was in him, following, as he did, such astute viceroys as Lord Dalhousie and 
Lord Canning. He did not go to India, however, without misgivings ; he 
felt as he left the shores of England that he would never again return to the 
homeland. 

He left England in January, 1862, and reached Calcutta on March 12. 
There was peace in the land, and, due to the thoroughness with which the 
Mutiny had been suppressed, there was no danger of any rebel outbreaks 
south of Peshawur. However, from the beginning his labors were far from 
being light. The majority of the officials under him were new to their work 
and the burden of much of it fell on the shoulders of the Viceroy. 

His policy was two-fold ; in the first place he determined that British 
sovereignty should be respected, and on the other hand he put forth every 
effort to deal kindly with the Indian chiefs and to win their love for British 
rule. He believed it to be the duty of a governor-general to know the country 
he was governing thoroughly, and so he decided to visit the provinces. On 
tht 5th of February, 1863, he set out in state on his tour of inspection. 
Durbars were held at Benares, Cawnpore and Agra, at which many of the 
most noted chiefs were present. He visited, besides, Delhi, Umballa and 
other places of interest and then turned northward into the hill region and 
early in April reached Simla. 

He rested for several months in this delightful spot, and towards the 
end of September was preparing to return to Calcutta when an outbreak 



338 BUILDEKS OF CANADA. 

among the Sitana &natics called his attention to the frontier regions. Lord 
Elgin was averse t« carrying on warlike operations on the northern frontier 
and in the previous year had allowed a similar rebellion to go unpunished. 
He was now told that this revolt was largely due to his leniency, and he came 
to th e conclusion " that the interests of both prudence and humanity would 
be best consulted by levelling a speedy and decisive blow at this embryo 
conspiracy." Freparatious were, therefore, made to destroy the place of 
refuge of the fanatics at Mulka. 

Lord Elgin left Simla, on September 26 with his ultimate destination, 
Peshawur. At this time he was in the best of health and his letters home 
were bright and cheerful, but before he reached Dhurmsala he was seized 
with an illness, that in a few brief weeks was to lay him in his grave. He 
soon realized that there was no hope for him and he faced the inevitable with 
Christian fortitude, rejoicing that he was to die in harness. Lady Elgin 
reached Calcutta in January, 1863, and was fortunately with him in the 
closing days of his life. His mind was clear until the end and he even had 
the spot in which he wished his body to lie chosen before his death, which 
occurred on November 20. Dean Stanley thus writes of the resting place of 
this great Viceroy of India. 

" He sleeps far away from his native land, on the heights of Dhurmsala ; 
a fitting grave, let us rejoice to think, for the Viceroy of India, overlooking 
from its lofty height the vast expanse of the hill and plain off these mighty 
provinces — a fitting burial beneath the snow-clad Himalaya «*ange, for one 
who dwelt with such serene satisfaction on all that was grand and beautifpl 
in man and nature — 

Pondering God's mysteries untold, 

And, tranquil as the glacier snow% 
He by those Indian Mountains old 

Might well repose." 

Like many another able and noble Englishman he gave his life for the 
Empire, and it was not unfitting that he should rest beneath the shadow of 
of those great hills which protect England's richest province from Northern 
invaders. It was not unfitting that the man whose field of action had V«en 
the Empire, who had guarded England's interests in Jamaica, in Canada, \n 



LOKD ELGIN. ' 839 



China, in Japan and in India, should find a resting place in this remote 
province of the Empire. His life had been full of work, and, although it was 
not generally so recognized at the time of his death, no part of his work had 
been performed to better purpose than that which he had done at the critical 
period of Canadian history. The unity and contentment existing in Canada 
are largely due to the wise and firm stand taken by him during his term as 
governor-general. 



CHAPTER XXIL 

SIR GEORGE ETIENNE CAETIBR. 

By J, CastelIv Hopkins. 

The Birth of Cartier — S«pp*sed to be Descended from one of the Nephews of Jacqnes Caitier — 
Studies at the College of St. Sulpice — Enters upon the Study of Law— Practises His 
Profession in Montreal — Sides with Papineau in the Rebellion of 1837 — After the Defeat of 
Rebels Cartier Flees to the United States — Returns to. Canada — Pardoned by the 
Government — Returned to Parliament for the County of Verch&res — Appointed Provincial 
Secretary in the Cabinet of Sir Allan McNab— In 1857 Appointed Attorney-General — Visits 
England in the Interests of a Federal Union — One of the Fathers of Confederation — A 
Member of the Canadian Assembly for Verch^res from 1848 to 1S61 — Returned for 
Montreal East in 1861 — A Member of the Executive Council of Canada — Entrusted with 
the Formation of a Government with Sir John A. McDonald — Attorney-General under Sir 
Etienne Tach6 — Member of the Colonial Conference, London, 1866-7 — Created a Baronet — 
Minister of Militia and Defence for the Dominion — Influential in Promoting the 
Construction of the Grand Trunk Railway and the Victoria Bridge — Dies in London- 
George Maclean Rose's Summing up of Cartier's Career, 

Sir George Etienne Cartier, ^linister of Militia, was born in the Village 
of St. Antoine, in the County of Verch^res, on the 6th of September, 1814. 
It was claimed for him that he was descended from one of the nephews of 
Jacques Cartier, the adventurous Breton navigator who showed to France the 
ocean pathways to a possible western empire. But aside from this interesting 
idea he made for himself in the history of his country a name and fame 
which, by right of native ability and resolute and fortunate effort, was 
permanently his own. His immediate ancestors were of the better class of 
French-Canadians. His grandfather, a successful merchant, was one of the 
first members chosen for the County of Vercheres when the Constitutional 
Act of 1791 gave to Lower Canada the right to representative institutions. 

In Lower Canada during the early days of George Etienne Cartier, as 
now, two avocationg possessed a strong attraction for the more gifted amongst 
the younger population. These were the Church and the Bar. Cartier chose the 
340 



SIR GEOPcGE ETIENNE OARTIEE. 841 

latter. To qualify himself for his intended profession, he pursued, for eight 
years, a course of study at the College of St. Sulpice, in the city of Montreal. 
After leaving college he entered upon the study of law, and in 1835 began to 
practise in Montreal. The secret of his success at that time and indeed 
throughout his life was an industry that never knew cessation, an energy that 
never faltered, and an ever-present consciousness of his own ability. 

And he had scarcely begun the practice of his profession when he was 
drawn into the political vortex. Louis Joseph Papineau, Speaker of the 
Legislative Assembly since the year 1817, had been flaming like a portentous 
meteor in the troubled sky of Canadian politics. Under his influence Cartier 
fell as did a majority of French-Canadians. By the Constitutional Act, in 
1791, Canada was divided into two parts known as Upper and Lower Canada. 
A Legislature was, by the Act, established in each Province. It consisted of 
a House of Assembly and a Legislative Council. The people elected the 
Assembly ; and the Crown nominated the Council. Then followed a long 
conflict between the two Chambers, between the French and the English, 
between demagogues on the one hand and office-holders on the other. It 
was a very much mixed up contest, and right was sometimes on the one side 
and sometimes on the other. In the end, the Rebellion of 1837 broke out. 
Cartier sided with Papineau. 

After the defeat of the rebels a reward was offered for the apprehension 
of the leading participants, and although Cartier was not mentioned in the 
list he fled to the United States. He afterwards returned home secretly and 
remained in hiding for a time. His seclusion was not of very long duration, 
however. An intimation from the authorities assured him that on presenting 
himself in public he would not be arrested. The promise was faithfully kept. 

For nearly ten years after this escapade M. Cartier took no active part in 
public life. In 1848, yielding to the pressure of his friends, he was returned 
to Parliament as the representative of his native County of Verch^res. 

In 1855, he was appointed Provincial Secretary in the Conservative 

Cabinet of Sir Allan McNab. Lie was not eager for office and had previously 

declined the Commissionership of Public Works. In 1857 M. Cartier began 

his first session as Attorney-General of Lower Canada in place of ]\Ir. 

19 



342 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

Drummond. During the next year Messrs. Cartier, Ross and Gait visite-i 
England in the interests of a Federal Union, but no action was taken by the 
Imperial authorities at the time. He took a most prominent part at a later 
period in the accomplishment of Confederation, and was a delegate at the 
Charlottetown Conference of 1864, and at the Quebec Conference which 
followed on Oct. 10. He was at one time president of the Montreal 
St. Jean Baptiste Society. He declined the Solicitor-Generalship of Lower 
Canada in 1851, the Commissionership of Public "Works in 1853, the 
Companionship of the Bath in 1867. He was a Government Director of the 
Grand Trunk Railway from November, 1852, to May, 1853, and was 
Solicitor to the Company for many years. He was an unsuccessful candidate 
for the Speakership of the Legislative Assembly of Canada in 1854. 

Sir George first entered Parliament as a supporter of Messrs. Lafontaine 
and Baldwin, became afterwards the principal supporter of Messrs. Hincks 
and Morin, and succeeded to the leadership of the French-Canadian 
Conservative party on the retirement of Sir L. H. Lafontaine and M. Morin. 
He sat for Verch^res in the Canadian Assembly from 1848 until the general 
election of 1861, when he was returned for Montreal East, which he 
represented until the Union, and for which he was an unsuccessful candidate 
at the general elections 1857 and 1873. He was a member of the Executive 
Council of Canada from the 27th January, 1855, to 29th July, 1858 ; from 
6th August latter year to 23rd May, 1862, and from the 30th March, 1864, 
to the Union ; and during the several periods was Provincial Secretary from 
January, 1855, to May, 1856, and Attorney-General, L. C, from the latter 
date until August 1, 1868, when he resigned office with the other 
members of the Cabinet. He was appointed Inspector-General on 6th August, 
1858. He was entrusted with the formation of a Government with the Hon. 
John A. Macdonald, in which he held office as Attorney-General, L. C, 
from 7th August, 1858, until 21st May, 1862, when he and his Cabinet 
r«dgned, being defeated • on the Militia Bill. He was a second time called 
npon to form a Government but declined in favor of the late Sir Etienne 



IZB QEOEGE KTIKNNE CAKTIER. 343 

Tach6, 1864, in whose administration he again held the office of Attorney- 
General, L. C, a position which he retained until the Union of the B. N. A. 
Provinces in July, 1867. 

He was a member of the Colonial Conference, London, 1866-7, which 
finally obtained the passage of the British North America Act of 1867. He 
was sworn a member of the Privy Council of Canada, created a Baronet, and 
appointed Minister of Militia and Defence for the Dominion on 1st July, 
1867, and in January, 1872, was created a Knight Grand Cross of the Royal 
Order of Isabella la Catolica (of Spain). In 1868 he was a delegate to 
England to confer with the Imperial Government respecting the defences of 
the Dominion, and the acquisition of the North West Territories. 

The Parliamentary Companion of 1872 enumerates some of the 
public measures which in part or whole owe their existence to Sir George 
Cartier, as follows: The construction of the Grand Trunk Railway, including 
the Victoria Bridge; the promotion of Education and the establishment oi 
Normal Schools; the improvement in several particulars of the Criminal 
Laws ; final abolition of Feudal Tenure ; determining and settling the laws 
with regard to Lands in the Townships of Lower Canada ; decentralization oi 
Justice in Lower Canada ; the Codification of the Civil Law and the 
Civil procedure of Lower Canada ; the Confederation of B. N. A. ; the 
re-organization of the Militia of the Dominion. After his defeat in Montreal 
i]i 1878 he was elected for Provencher, Manitoba, but died shortly after in 
England on May 20. He was given a public funeral in Montreal, at which 
a multitude of people accorded the last tribute of respect to a great career. 

George MacLean Rose in his Representative Canadians, sums up Sir 
George Cartier's career as follows: "He is looked upon, and perhaps 
deservedly, by the French-Canadian people as the greatest statesman that the 
French province has ever produced. M. Cartier was a hard and fast partyist, 
but a devoted friend of his race. The great secret of his success was his 
strong ambition, and his almost phenomenal perseverance and energy. In 
private life his name was always above reproach, and in his public capacity, 
although, as stated, a conspicuous type of a partyist, very little of definite 
reproach clings about his name. Indeed, some of his admirers, and those 



844 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

whose statements are entitled to regard, aver that the great statesman made a 
practice of sacrificing his private interests to those of the public. As a 
speaker he was sometimes regarded as tiresome, but it would be more correct 
to say that he was exhaustive. It was customary with those who heard him 
make speeches to say after he had sat down, that nothing more remained to be 
said. Every point of value was brought into light, every argument of weight 
was skilfully marshalled and made to bear in the direction of the speaker's 
contentions. He had the gift, too, of being master of both English and 
French." 



CHAPTER XXIII. 

HON, GEORGE BROWN. 
By Wi 1,1,1AM Buckingham. 

A Busy Ufe Shortened by a Tragic Death— The Uncrowned King of Upper Canada— Supreme 
in the Command of His Own Party — Forces upon Mr. John A. Macdonald the Temporary 
Peace which was the Prelude to Confederation— An Untiring Worker — Peter and George 
Brown Establish "The Banner" in Toronto — George Brown Becomes the Ally of the 
Liberal Ministers— Founds "The Globe" — Makes an Enemy of Rev. Dr. Egerton Ryerson 
— The Character of his Editorial Work — An Intensely Earnest Writer — A Man of Great 
Truth and Honesty— Makes Enemies of the Roman Catholics by His Attacks on the Pope 
and His Institutions — Elected to the Legislative Assembly in 1851 — Gains Tory Hostility 
by His Defence of the Rebellion Losses Bill— A Staunch Advocate of Free Trade- 
Advocates the Secularization of the Clergy Reserves — The "Double Shuffle "—George 

Brown One of the Great Fathers of Confederation — Defeated in South Oxford in 1867 

Accepts Nomination to the Upper Chamber — Declines Knighthood — His Assassination— 
His Uutimelj' Death, 

IN the person of George Brown, a busy and agitated life was shortened by a 
tragic death. But though it was a death that came from violence, he 
had not the satisfaction, poor though that might be, of feeling in his long 
resulting illness that it was occasioned by his services to the country. The 
assassins of McGee, Lincoln, and Garfield, made pretence of public motives 
for their action, but the misguided man who shot George Brown did it 
merely to avenge an imaginary and petty personal wrong. Mr. Brown had 
passed the meridian span of life with the turmoil and strife of his earlier 
years, and there are good grounds for beheving that he had gladly sought to 
obtain a measure of retirement and repose amidst scenes and influences more 
congenial to his chastened and subdued spirit, perhaps also to his better 
nature, when in this wretched manner his death came. Those of his own 
generation, then still largely to the fore, but since that time mostly passed 
away, who attended his funeral to pay the last tribute of respect to his 
memory, and who had been stirred by him in their youjiger days as few men 

347 



348 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

could stir a people, while thinking again of his exploits, heard once more the 
trumpet notes of his calls to battle high sounding above the solemn dirges 
that followed him to the gravt. There had been in Canada before his time, 
there has been in the broader Canada he helped to make, no political warrior 
with equal power to sound those notes so loud and clear. 

In 1857, when the writer of this sketch first came to know him, and an 
acquaintance was formed in his service which continued to the close, Mr. 
Brown was in the heyday of his prodigious strength and influence. He had 
reached the zenitli of his physical and mental power, and was being borne on 
by the elasticity of his mind and character, and the buoyant spirit of the 
young, and fast developing, and resourceful western counties of the Province 
at his back, towards political heights he clearly saw, though he was enabled 
to scale them but once, and then for a mere moment to retain his foothold. 

At that period he was the uncrowned king — ^th® self-constituted chamjaon 

of the rights of Upper Canada — a championship which very few in his own 

party ever dreamt of questioning. One there was who in an unguarded 

moment at the Toronto Convention of 1867 hinted at the fear of a 

dictatorship. The mere suggestion was enough. The mutinous member 

went no further. Mr. Brown was down upon him with his disciplinary lash 

at once. He said : " I scorn the imputation. I stand here at the end of 

twenty-five years' service to the Reform party, and I defy any man to show 

the first act of selfishness of which I have ever been guilty with reference to 

that party. I defy any man to point to one word that has ever crossed my 

lips, as the representative of the people — one motion I ever made — one speech 

I ever delivered — one vote I ever gave— which is not in harmony with th-e 

principles of the Reform party of Upper Canada." The emeute, if any were 

intended, stopped right there. It had previously been manifested in the 

disobedience to orders of Mr. Brown's colleagues in the coalition Government, 

Mr. McDougall and Mr. Howland, who refused to retire with their leader 

when he gave the signal, and who faced him on the platform on the occasion 

of that great gathering. But their incitement to rebellion was brought at the 

outset to an inglorious end. Mr. Brown was supreme in command of his own 

forces, and it is probably because he was so well able at that time to ke^ 



HON. GEORGE BROWN. 340 

Aem in hand that after a long struggle, he forced upon Mr. John A. 
Macdonald— a greater leader than himself, success in leadership being the 
criterion— the temporary peace which was the prelude to Confederation. 

But to return to the earlier period. Towards the close of the fifties Mr. 
Brown was in the full vigor of his manhood, verging upon forty years of age, 
with no marriage ties to bind him to the family circle; in stature, inches 
above the average of his fellow-men, broad in proportion, tall and straight, 
and strong, as in the Miltonic metaphor, "the mast of some great ammiral,'' 
a notable figure on King street, where he was so often seen swinging and 
striding along that well-known Toronto thoroughfare : 

" The front of Jove himself ; 
An eye like Mars, to threaten and command." 

Those words " to threaten and command " are very exact in their description 
of George Brown. From the great frame came forth a voice mighty and 
unfailing, like the never-ending and over-bearing roar and rush of Niagara. • 
He had, too, the strength of a Hercules, enabling the powerful machinery to be 
kept incessantly at work, so that it never needed to succumb to that weakness of 
feeling tired, which he so heartily despised in others. He was, in very truth, 
the incarnation of energy. « Put plenty of work on me," he wrote during an 
election campaign in 1851. " I can speak six or eight hours a day easily." 
Yes, all of that, and a great deal more, not only then, but onwards for 
twenty-five years, as his weary reporters, whose duty it was to follow him up 
and down the country, so well knew. 

Some of his best work he had already done. Coming to Canada, in 
1843, to extend in these provinces the circulation of the British Chronicle, a 
paper his father and himself had estabUshed in New York, in advocacy of the 
principles of the Free Church of Scotland, he saw here opened to them a 
promising political as well aa religious field, and of this he was not slow to 
induce his father to join him in taking possession. 'Bu Chronicle in New 
York ceased to be published, and Peter and George Brown, in place of it. 



350 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

started The Banner in Toronto. At that time the Baldwin-Lafontaine 
Government was in existence, but not really in power, and was tottering to 
its fall. The statesmanlike proposals of Lord Durham, following the rebellion 
of 1837, with Ministerial responsibility to the people as the cardinal principle 
of administration, were for still a further period impeded by the influence k.. 
what is known as the Family Compact. It has been happily said by Mr. 
Brown's biographer, Mr. Alexander Mackenzie, that " the battle had been 
fought, and in a manner won, but the enemy had not been followed up." 
George Brown's aim was to secure its fruits — ^to wrest from unwilling hands, 
by constitutional measures, that which William Lyon Mackenzie had failed 
to accomplish by force of arms. He became the ally of the Liberal ministers. 
They had beaten the Tory Cabinet at the polls, but had not yet gained the 
victory. They were now in conflict with their titular chief, Lord Metcalfe, 
the Governor-General of the Canadas, and the struggle reached its height 
concurrently with the issue of the initial number of The Banner. The 
Ministers, successful with the people, were beaten by the representative of the 
Crown. Lord Metcalfe declined to take the advice of his ministers on a 
question of patronage, and they promptly resigned. 

Then the necessity was presented for a journal more pronouncedly 
political than the publishers of a primarily religious paper like The Banner 
were free to make it, and George Brown took a step which was pregnant with 
results to Canada ; he founded The Globe. Apt and forceful in all things, he 
selected for its motto a sentence from Junius, singularly suitable to the 
occasion : " The subject who is truly loyal to the Chief Magistrate will 
neither advise nor submit to arbitrary measures." And let the question here 
be asked, did Mr. Brown ever fail to assert this principle ? Did either he or 
The Globe ever make submission ? The answer is, never 1 The Olobe and 
Mr. Brown have each in turn been accused of the fault they imputed to others, 
of being arbitrary. But whether this be true or not, it is quite safe to say 
they have never at any time been known to tolerate the like failing in any 
other person or paper. 



HON. QEOSaB BX0W2«, 35 i 

From the moment of its inception The Globe became a power in the 
land, and by its aid the servant quickly rose to the position of master. 
Ordinarily 

** We build the ladder by which we rise 
From the lowly earth to the vaulted skies ; 
And we mount the summit round by round.** 

Mr. Brown built the ladder, truly enough, but by it he leapt to the vaulted 
skies from the lowly earth, many rungs at a time. Almost at a bound he 
became the leading figure in Liberal or "Reform" politics. It is not 
proposed here to enter upon an academic discussion of the oft-asked question, 
whether Mr. Brown was greater with the pen than on the platform, but if the 
question really needed an answer, what better could be given than that of my 
Uncle Toby : " There is much to be said on both sides." In Mr. Brown 
both sides were strongly developed. And they were each self-developed. He 
had not recovered from the feeling he inspired of wonder at his power as a 
writer when he created a new source of wonderment at his power as a speaker. 
The one operated with the other, acting and re-acting in urging him rapidly 
onward to the climax in his career. 

A clear and just distinction was lately drawn by the present editor of 
The Globe between the Canadian journals of past days and those of the present 
time, when he said the earlier newspapers were " political rather than 
national." It must be confessed that his distinguished predecessor helped to 
make them so. Mr. Brown was to the very core loyal and national in 
sentiment ; but he was, over and above all, a politician. The press of Upper 
Canada was in every way feeble at the time of the Brown invasion. Strong 
language was heard on the stump and in the forum, but there was a too 
plentiful lack of strength in the language of the press. George Brown 
changed this at once. From the moment he took up the editorial pen, it 
became instinct with energy. He breathed into its nostrils the breath of life. 
Of course he roused opposition, and notably in the person of the Rev. Dr. 
Egerton Ryerson. A couple of amusing letters passed between the two men 
in 1868, when, on the sixty-fifth anniversary of his birth, the Christian 
minister, in the tone of meekness pertaining to his sacred calling raised anew 



352 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

the spirit of the old Adam in the breast of his antagonist by the offer of 
hearty forgiveness for the personal wrongs he assumed George Brown had 
don3 him in years gone by. George Brown, from whom the offence was 
supposed to have come, spurned the offer, and carried the war back into 
Africa. The messenger who bore the peaceful missive returned with a 
terrible answer, quite opposed to Dr. Ryerson's hope of the enjoyment of a full 
measure of happiness on that glad day. " As to your personal attacks upon 
myself," said Brown, " those who pursue the fearless course of a public 
journalist and politician, as I have done for a quarter of a century, cannot 
expect to escape abuse and misrepresentation. . . . Your dragging my 
name into your controversy . . . in a matter in which I had no concern 
whatever, was one of those devices unhappily too often resorted to in political 
squabbles to be capable of more than momentary indignation." That sufficed 
for the political parson. The dove with the olive branch went forth 
no more. 

Politics ought not to be everything to a newspaper, but politics were 
everything to The Globe. Signed articles were not used then any more than 
they are now, and of signed articles to denote the personality of this writer 
there was no need whatever. His individuality was constantly being revealed 
in paragraphs condensed and forceful in language, emphatic with black 
lettering, pointed with index fingers, abounding with dashes, and bristling 
and pungent with marks of exclamation. Sometimes the style of attack was 
extravagant, and, if the phrase be permissable, the conclusions were 
inconclusive. In point, let the curious case be cited of the puzzled reader 
who one day was told by The Globe that the " cup of the iniquity of the 
Government is running over," and on the following day that " the cup of the 
iniquity of the Government is nearly full." But if he thought the writer 
himself to have been in his cups he would be quite mistaken, for the Browns 
were the most abstemious of men, as they were purest in mind. It was not 
often that such a slip of the pen occurred, and when it did happen, it was 
attributable entirely to the desire to make the case strong. Strong, to be sure, 
it always was. There was little of exposition, of denunciation a very great 



HON. GEORGE BROWN. 353 

deal. The work was not done by proxy, but by Mr. Brown himself, by his 
own pen, never by the " abhorred shears," for which he had no use. 

News had not then become the feature that it is in our own time. It 
did not therefore form a counter attraction to the philippics of the editor. 
Invariably the reader's first impulse, on receiving The Globe, damp from the 
press, when George Brown was editor, was to turn to the inside page for the 
tonic, which was invariably to be got there to keep him braced up — a new 
stimulant compounded " every lawful day " from the same prescription. 

It is quite true the medicine had not the sweetness which is associated 
with pleasantry, and that it contained but few of the agreeable ingredients 
which are derivable from books, for Mr. Brown was not a wide reader or a 
witty writer. His reliance was solely upon his intense earnestness and sledge- 
hammer force, and these never failed of themselves to carry him successfully 
through. His articles were the talk of the country side, and the pabulum as 
well of the country press, for when the great dog barked, all the httle dogs 
barked in chorus. In our own age we are sometimes confronted with the 
proposition, whether with the attractions offered by a constant supply of so 
many different kinds of news fresh from all quarters of the universe, editorial 
writing is destined to maintain its supremacy. But this was a proposition 
never thought of in George Brown's office or by the readers of his paper, for 
the supremacy of what he wrote over all other kinds of matter then obtainable 
was unquestionable and unquestioned. He had no patience with long 
arguments, nice distinctions, subtle disquisitions. His delight Was in rough 
vigor and terse expression. Writers have been said to be like teeth, divided 
into incisors and molars. Mr. Brown was powerful with both. He could 
tear a fallacy into rags and grind it into pulp. Elegance, fine flavour, beauty 
of illustration, were not of his nature. The questions with him were, " Can 
the statement be made forceful ?" *' Can it be made to tell ?" He was the 
god of the Scandinavian mythology — the god with the hammer. With a fyle 
of 2^6 Globe before him, Carlyle would have found it an easy thing, had he 
liked to do so, to add to his heroes and his worship of heroes, " the hero as 
journalist," for George Brown was a strong man after his own heart 



354 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

Brown's personality was intense, and he impressed it upon Ms paper 
with all the force of his masculine and ardent nature. He never followed, 
but always led. He never stood on the defensive, but was always the 
aggressor. He was a Napoleon, rapidly moving and constantly forming his 
columns for attack. Rarely in office, he had no need of explanations of 
policy. If denied the sense of power in the councils of the country, he felt he 
possessed it at the lever of the printing press. He was the shaper and creator 
of public opinion, not its creature. His was the directing mind, setting in 
motion the whole Liberal journalistic machinery of the Province. From 
every centre of influence in the West, the tempests which had their origin in 
the office of the Toronto (r^o&e were wafted back with the same certainty as 
the storms we see nowadays starting forth in obedience to the call of the deiis 
ex machina of the meteorological observatory. 

It must, however, be admitted that father and son alike were on other 
lines than politics most rigid. They were as apostolic as Paul in advocacy of 
" whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things 
are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever 
things are of good report." "With frigid and prudish minds they guarded the 
columns of their paper against the intrusion of reports of sport, whether in 
their nature healthy or unhealthy, or gambling in stocks, or the clean or 
unclean productions of the stage. Their pleasures and those of their readers 
were taken sadly in the disturbed pool of party politics ; but for both there 
was the constant heartsickness which springs from hope deferred. Politics 
was the standing puddle of those days, through which was dragged the inner , 
and outward belongings of public men, while clothing of other kinds was 
cleanly washed and bleached and very stiffly starched. 

The debate in the British House of Commons in 1851, when Lord John 
Russell passed the Ecclesiastical Titles Bill to meet the Bull of the Pope 
giving territorial designations in England to Cardinal Wiseman and the 
Bishops of his Church, was a great occasion for The Globe. It attacked the 
Pope and his institutions with a vigor of expression which had no 
counterpart in the language, intemperate as it was, of the English country 
gentlemen themselves. Mr. Brown's extreme course in the early part of 




THE HON. SIR OLIVER MOWAT, G.C.M.G., LL.D. 

Vriine Minister of Ontario, 1S72-1896 



HON. GEORGE BllOWN. 357 

his life when Popery was to him as the red flag to the bovine, caused liim a 
great deal of uneasiness in after days, and was for years a serious stumbling 
block in the path of the Liberal party. It had much to do in causing his 
defeat when he ran against William Lyon Mackenzie in Haldimand in 1851, 
and it was in itself enough to justify the expression Mr. Brown more than 
once applied to himself of being a " governmental impossibility." It is 
natural in. a country with the mixed races and diverse religious beliefs of 
Canada that this should be so. Intolerance of opinion on cherished subjects 
is a powerful weapon in pulling down, but weak in building up, and their 
was little statesmanship in Mr. Brown's uncompromising hostility, during all 
the years of his more active political life, to the Church and language of 
Lower Canada, In 1871, twenty years after the Haldimand defeat, 
when Confederation was supposed finally to have composed the religious 
differences of the community, Mr. Brown wrote a memorable letter of 
explanation and defence, intended to reunite with the Liberal party the 
many members of the Roman Catholic Church who had been in unison with 
it until 1850, but had since that time assumed an attitude of estrangement. 
But it must be admitted that Catholics and Protestants of the Liberal party 
did not act again together with the old cordiality and the old confidence in 
each other until Mr. Brown had ceased to take a dominant part in public 
alTairs. 

"They stood aloof, the scars remaining, 
I/ike cliffs which had been rent asunder ; 
A dreary sea now flowed between." 

From the issue of the J5anner in 1843, down to Confederation in 1867, 
when Mr. Brown left the popular arena and the Liberal leadership was placed 
in commission, to so remain until, with the concurrence of his Parliamentary 
colleagues, it was tacitly taken up by Mr. Mackenzie, and formally conferred 
upon him in 1872, there was here, as there was during the long anti-slavery 
agitation in the United States, " an irrepressible conflict between opposing 
and enduring forces." 

The purpose of biographical writing being to proclaim the man, the way 
to proclaim George Brown is through his style — the way in which he 
proclaimed himself — Le style c'est Vhomme. Mr. Brown's style has been dwelt 



858 BUILDERS OF CANADA, 

upon with some degree of fulness because it explained so much that there 
was about him, and because it made him the powerfal factor everybody 
admitted him to be in the poHtics of Canada, thirty, forty, and fifty years ago. 
It was by means of his style more than anything else that he commanded the 
obedience of his fellowmen from the first, and retained it to the last. A 
master of sentences, he was slow to forsake their construction in the sanctum 
of The Globe for the acclamations which awaited him on the stump, on the 
platform and in Parliament. With rare reticence in a man like him, he 
resisted the overtures to contest a seat in the Legislative Assembly until 
April, 1851, when he met with failure in Haldimand, but he was returned at 
the general election later in the same year for Kent, which he represented 
until 1854. From that time until the election of 1857, he sat for Lambton. 
He then had the unusual honor of a double return — ^for North Oxford and 
for the city of Toronto — ^largely through the prancings on the streets of that 
good old Tory city of "the Protestant horse." Electing to sit for Toronto, he 
continued its member until 1863, when once more he tried a change of saddle, 
and became member for South Oxford. As the representative of South 
Oxford he took a foremost part in the measures for Confederation, which 
accomplished, he offered in the consequent elections of 1867 for still another 
seat, that of South Ontario, and suffering a reverse, he devoted himself 
exclusively to the combination on a large scale of journalism with practical 
farming, until his call to the Senate in 1873. 

The great political movements of his time belong to the domain of 
history. In each of these movements Mr. Brown's towering person was 
invariably seen rising high amongst his fellows. He came in, like Lord 
Elgin, for a share of Tory hostility for his defence of the Rebellion Losses 
Bill. Lord Elgin was assailed in Montreal, and an attack was made upon 
the House of George Brown in Toronto. While supporting the Reform 
go^^rnment in 1851 he gave a summary of what Liberalism had 
accomplished, in his address to the electors of Haldimand : (1) control over 
the executive government ; (2) religious equahty ; (3) a national system of 



HON. GEORGE BROWN. 859 

education free from sectarian bias ; (4) municipal institutions ; (5) great 
l^ublic works ; (6) an amended jury law ; (7) an improved assessment 
system ; (8) cheap postage. 

A staunch advocate of free trade, he was sanguine enough to look 
forward to the time when the entire Customs department should be abolished, 
and the ports of Canada be thrown wide open to the world — a vision in 
statesmanship not yet realized. 

Under the inspiration of The Globe, a considerable section of the Liberal 
party became impatient at the tardiness of the Baldwin-Lafontaine 
government, which came into power in 1847, in giving effect to their 
professed policy, especially in the direction of what Mr. Brown called state 
churchism. With the Reformers of Upper Canada nearly a unit against the 
bulk of the Tories in that Province in the demand for the abolition of the 
Clergy Reserves, and with the members of both parties from Lower Canada 
solidly knit to oppose it, the position of the Liberal government was one of 
extreme difficulty. Mr. Lafontaine held to the sacredness of the religious 
endowments, not as the entire belongings of the Church of England and the 
Church of Scotland, but as the heritage of all denominations of Protestants ; 
while Mr. Brown and his followers — about that time dubbed by Mr. Malcolm 
Cameron, because of their tenacity, " clear Grits " — were clamorous for their 
complete removal, through the agency of secularization. Finding the position 
at length intolerable, Mr. Baldwin and Mr. Lafontaine retired, and Mr. Hincks 
succeeded to the Liberal leadership. Mr. Hincks declared that the 
continuance of the agitation was calculated to endanger the Provincial 
Union, and that, in order to maintain the Union, if the necessary support for 
carrying on the Government was not to be had from the Liberals, he was 
prepared to join hands with the Tories. Then The Globe went squarely into 
opposition, and it continued onwards for many years to shake the foundation 
of governments, until the tension was relieved in 1867 by the Imperial Act of 
Union of the Provinces of British North America. During that period Mr. 
Brown saw the Clergy Reserves secularized by the ministry of Sir Allan 
McNab without the realization of the fear of Mr. Hincks as to the disruption 
of the bond between the two Provinces; and Mr. Brown was himself 



360 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

successful in the next great movement to which he gave his attention by 
securing representation on the basis of population, and along with it the 
ultimate union of the Provinces of British North America. 

But before passing from the Clergy Reserves question, it will be well to 
quote a sentence or two from the speech Mr. Brown delivered on that subject 
in Toronto in 1S51, as illustrative of his mode of platform warfare. " I 
hold," he said, " the principle and practice of Establishments to be ahke bad. 
I view the payment of religious teachers by the State to be injurious to the 
cause of Christ, injurious to the pastors, injurious to the people, and mjurious 
to the State. I hold that that church which cannot be maintained by the 
voluntary contributions of the Christian people is not worth supporting." 
" It is true," he went on to say, " that learned ecclesiastics have shown from 
Holy Writ that Kings were to be nursing fathers, and Queens nursing 
mothers to the church, and that by the nicest arguments they have attempted 
to establish on this foundation a whole fabric of priestcraft ; " a fabric which 
he proceeded at once to raze to the ground. " Let us vow," so concluded his 
peroration, " that we shall never give up the battle until victory has been 
fully accomplished ; and let us keep ever before us the goal we must reach — 
no reserves 1 no rectories I no sectarian education ! no ecclesiastical 
corporations 1 no sectarian money grants I no sectarian preferences whatever !" 
No one would be bold enough to say that this was the ipsissima verba of the 
speech, as it was actually delivered, or that any of his other speeches appeared 
in The Globe in the precise language of the platform, for Mr. Brown used few 
notes, and if a most powerful speaker, he was far from being exact, and his 
printed orations were subjected by him to a considerable degree of added force 
and editorial embellishment. 

The struggle on the representation question was much the same sort of 
battle as the struggle on the Clergy Reserves had been. The movement, 
strong among the people in the western part of Upper Canada, made little 
advance at first in Parliament. It was resisted by the solid impact of Lower 
Canada, and by Liberals and Conservatives alike in the easterly constituencies 
of the Western Province, whose population had become stationary, and who 
watched the growth of counties like Huron and Bruce with a jealous eye In 



HON. GEORGE BROWN. 861 

the few lines on this question in the High School history for Ontario there is 
a strange misconception, the writer placing at the head of the impelling 
forces George Brown, William McDougall and Antoine A. Dorion, and at the 
head of the resisting forces John A. Macdonald and George Etienne Cyrtier. 
To the latter should be added John Sandfield Macdonald and his brother, 
Donald A. Macdonald, both at this period, in all else but this, very advanced 
Liberals, and Mr. Dorion himself, who, instead of being in the movement as 
a co-leader with Mr. Brown, with whom he agreed on most other measures of 
prime importance, joined with the enemy in opposing with all his power the 
swelling hordes which finally swept him, the three Macdonalds, Cartier and 
and all else before them. Even in the Confederation debates, after the battle 
had gone fairly against him, Mr. Dorion spoke in words of bitterness of his 
former colleagues ; and in a previous stage of the history of the movement, 
Sandfield Macdonald quite rivalled Cartier in denunciation. Cartier set off 
against the bone and sinew of the west, the codfish in Gaspe Basin, but 
Sandfield Macdonald, with equal if not greater contempt, spoke of his newly- 
arrived Scottish kinsmen in Huron and Bruce as Paisley weavers who were 
still wearing the coats of whitewash that were given them when they were 
taken into quarantine at Grosse Isle. John A. Macdonald certamly never 
said anything worse than that of George Brown's contingent, and George 
Brown was never more bitter towards Sandfield Macdonald in retort. Brown 
cared little for what John A. Macdonald might say, but a great deal for what 
was said by Sandfield Macdonald and Dorion ; the fire within the ranks 
being always hottest and most destructive. Yet, on the whole, he acted 
towards Dorion and Sandfield Macdonald with a degree of forbearance 
scarcely to be expected from one of his warlike and impulsive temperament. 
He was very different in his treatment of Wilham Lyon Mackenzie, the " little 
rebel," as he once called him; a Liberal and of all Liberals the most 
pronounced. 

Mr. Brown never conquered the counties of his Province which vero-ed 

upon Lower Canada, but the rest of Upper Canada he hammered into line ; 

not all at once, but by repeated blows, during which many governments rose 

and fell, among the number his own short-lived Ministry which he fof^-z^d 
20 



362 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

with the aid of Mr, Dorion, in 1858, and that of Mr. Sandfield Macdonald, 
which succumbed in 1864, after a feeble and fitful existence. Sandfield 
Macdonald wanted to substitute for the increased representation of Upper 
Canada according to its population the unworkable project of the two 
majorities. This meant that the government of the day must command a 
majority from each Province. His scheme of course failed, and he had in 
turn to retire from oflSce. 

It is not proposed here to more than touch upon the topic so familiar to 
the past generation by the name of the " double shufile." This event was 
the defeat of the sometimes Macdonald-Cartier, at other times Cartier- 
Macdonald, government, through the reiterated demands from the west for 
representation according to its increasing population ; the call by Sir Edmund 
Head to his counsels of Mr. Brown and Mr. Dorion ; their immediate defeat 
on a resolution of non-confidence in the House, where they had vacated their 
seats by acceptance of office ; the refusal by the Governor-General of a 
dissolution ; and the taking by the previous Ministers of double sets of oaths 
and offices, so as to evade the necessity of returning to their constituents for 
re-election. Such was the ** double shuffle." But the discussion of the 
subject is too long and too controversial for the pages of this work. Perhaps 
not less so is the controversy on the fatherhood of Confederation. But as the 
writer has expressed in other ways his opinion on the tenability of Mr. 
Brown's claim to this national distinction he may be allowed to state, as he 
proposes to do in a paragraph, the grounds upon which the claim is based, as 
an ending to the brief outline he has given of the principal events of Mr. 
Brown's most active life. 

So far back as the early part of 1858 Mr. Brown suggested to Mr. Holton 
of Montreal, as the remedy for the increasing difficulties of government, a 
comprehensive union. "A federal union, it appears to me," he said, "cannot be 
entertained for Canada (Upper and Lower Canada, as Canada then was) alone, 
but when agitated must include all British America." It is true he despaired 
in his time of its accomplishment, thinking, as he added, that " we will be 
past caring for politics when that measure is finally achieved ; " but in this 
respect under estimating the potency of the demands for representation by 



HON. OBORGB BROWN. 368 

population, through whose agency it was not long afterwards brought about. 
In 1859 Mr. Brown called a convention in Toronto, and advocated in lieu of 
the existing legislative union the adoption of the federal principle. He 
moved in the same sense at the ensuing session of Parliament. The policy 
thus outlined was, it is true, limited in its application to Upper and Lowei 
Canada. For its further extension the country was not yet prepared. But 
events were .moving with great rapidity. In the session of 1864, Mr. Brown 
took advantage of the weakness of the Tache government, which had 
succeeded the government of Sandfield Macdonald, to obtain a Committee on 
constitutional changes, and as Chairman of the Committee, on the 14th June 
of that year, he reported in favor of the federative system to be applied 
either to Upper and Lower Canada alone, or to the whole of British North 
America. The report was adopted with only three dissentients, one of the 
three being Mr. John A. Macdonald. Next day the Tach6 Government, with 
Mr. Macdonald as its leading spirit, was defeated on a direct vote of want of 
confidence. Mr. Brown's time had now come. He might have taken 
advantage of his tiiumph to try to form a government, but had he succeeded 
in doing so, no degree of permanency was possible in the state of parties then 
existing, aud he took the patriotic and wiser course of asking his opponents 
to confer upon the basis of Confederation. Meetings between the hitherto 
hostile leaders were arranged for ; a coalition government was formed, with 
Mr. Brown, Mr. Mowat and Mr. McDougall as Liberal members ; and on July 
1, 1867, Greater Canada sprang into existence as a confederated country. 
Mr. Brown remained sufficiently long with his strange associates to see the 
enterprise far enough on the pathway to insure its ultimate success, but his 
dislike of restraint induced him to quit the ship before it was fairly launched, 
and towards the close of 1865 he changed the close and stifling atmosphere of 
the Cabinet for the open air of freedom so necessary to him. Mr. Goldwin 
Smith once said in the Byt^fnnder, "The parent of Confederation was Dead 
Lock." Yes, but who produced Dead Lock? Who but George Brown? 
George Brown brought the disease to its crisis, and George Brown prescribed 
the cure. 



364 BUILDEES OF CANADA. 

In the general elections of 1867, following Confederation, Mr. Brown 
was defeated in South Oxford, so that he was excluded trom the first 
Parliament of united Canada, and from that time onward he showed but little 
disposition to re-enter public life. He accepted nomination to the Upper 
Chamber in December, 1873, but allowed a whole session to pass without 
taking his seat. In 1874 he negotiated for Canada a treaty of commerce with 
the United States, but like the measures of amity between England and the 
United States of later times, it met its grave in the Congressional Senate. On 
the death of Mr. Crawford in 1875, Mr. Brown was offered the appointment 
of Lieutenant-Governor of Ontario, but declined it, rightly concluding that it 
was a position incompatible with the editorial direction of The Globe, and 
declaring again, as he had often declared before, that he would rather be 
editor of The Globe than receive any dignitv or office in the gift of either the 
Crown or the people. In 1879 a knighthood was a second time pressed upon 
him, and it was thought that he would at last bend his form and take it, for 
he went to Montreal to meet the Governor-General, who was charged with the 
duty of investiture. But he surprised His Excellency and all who were not 
in the secret, by putting it from him with an expression of his thanks. 
With change of sky he had changed his mind ; rather let it be said that he 
had never been sufficiently imbued with the notion of acceptance, and, 
convinced against his will, his opinion had remained the same. 

Had he taken the honor, he would not have lived long to enjoy it. A 
few months afterwards, in his sixty-second year, in March, 1880, a man 
named Bennett, who had been discharged for misconduct from the service of 
The Globe, shot him with a pistol. No one thought that the wound thus 
inflicted was likely to prove fatal in its consequences ; least of all Mr. Brown 
himself. But the occurrence aroused him to preternatural activity, and in 
this frame of mind, refusing to take needed bodily and mental repose, on a 
bright Sunday in the ensuing May he died. He had insisted on continuing 
to do business in his chamber, where he held meetings and declared 
dividends. Perhaps not so much his hurt, as his characteristic disregard of 
it, as being a mere trifle, prevented his recovery. In scenes of excitement he 
had passed the many years of his toilsome life ; in disquiet he spent the 




MONUMENT AT OTTAWA TO SIR JOHN A. MACDONALD 



HON. GEORGE BROWN. 867 

weeks of weary sickness that had brought it to a close ; and not till death was 
the perturbed spirit to find repose. After his constant buflfetings with the 
world; of achievements which brought with them so few of the fruits oi 
victory ; of strifes and disappointments ; of the sense of possession of great 
powers, and of their use to the accomplishment of such poor personal results ; 
who shall say that the restful ending of it all, when it came to him was 
unwelcome ? His had been the stormy life of Lear, and at its going out tU 
sympathetic ear might have caught the wailing tones of Kent's refrain : 

" Vex not his ghost. O, let him pass ! he hates him, 
That would upou the rack of this tough w«rld 

Stretch him out longer." 

Followed by Edgar's reflective response : " He is gone, indeed "; and Kent's 
rejoinder : 

" The wonder is he hath endured so long, " 



CHAPTER XXIV. 

THE RIGHT HON. 8IR JOHN A. MACDONALDl 
By David Creighton. 

Sir John A. Macdonald for fifty years the Leading Parliamentarian in Canada — Of Scotch 
Parentage — PMuoated at Kingston — Begins tlie Study of Law— His Early Associations 
with Oliver Rlowat — His Defence of Von Shoultz — luiters the Political Arena as a Tory — 
A Ufe-Long Imperialist — In 1S47 Appointed Receiver-General — Opposes Rebellion Losses 
Bill — Endeavors to Have Seat of Government Moved to Kingston— Mr. Macdonald and 
Mr. Brown — Attitnde of "The Globe" — Introduces a Bill for tlie Secularization of the 
Clergy Reserves— Leader iu the Assembly — Called on by the Governor-General to Form a 
Ministry— Ottawa Chosen as the Seat of Government— The '• Double Shuffle "—The Trent 
Affair — A Dead-Lock in the Canadian Parliament — A Federal Union Proposed — 
Preliminary Steps Towards Confederation — John A. Macdonald, a Leader in the 
Confederation Movement — Receives Knighthood — The Building up of the Great 
Dominion — Difficulties between the United States and Canada — The Treaty of Washington 
Ratified — Made an Imperial l*rivy Councillor — The CanadianPacific Railway Projected — 
Mr. L. S. Huntington's Charges against the Government Sir John out of Office — Once 
More in Power — His Cabinet — The National Policy— Holds the Confidence of the Canadian 
People — His Last Great Triumph and His Death — The Empire Mourns Canada's Greatest 
Statesman. 

TO give a sketch of the career of one who during well-nigh half a 
century took an active part, and for the greater portion of that time 
the leading part, in the Parliamentary government of Canada, who 
exercised a most potent share in moulding the destiny of the Dominion and 
occupied a more conspicuous position before the public than any other 
Oiinadiau statesman, — is practically to write the history of Canada during that 
period. Within the limits to which the present work necessarily confines me 
only the more prominent features in the career of the Right Hon. Sir John 
Alexander Macdonald, P. C, G. C. B., can therefore be touched upon. 

Although of an ancient Highland family, his pai-ents, Hugh Macdonald 
and Helen Shaw, had removed fi-om Dornoch, in Sutherlandshire, to Glasgow, 
when John Alexander, their second son, was born on the 11th of January, 1816. 
Mr. Hugh Macdonald, not thriving in Glasgow, resolved to try hia fortune in 
368 



rHK RIGHT HON. SIR JOHN A. MACDONALD. Sgp 

the then wilderness of Upper Canada, whither he emigrated with his young 
family in 1820, when the future Prime Minister was but five years of age. 
After a brief residence in Kingston he removed to Adolphustown, in the 
county of Lennox, to start shop-keeping, subsequently going across the Bay to 
the Stone Mills in Prince Edward County, where for some years he kept a grist- 
mill. But ill-success seems to have dogged his footsteps wherever he went 
and, eventually, he returned to Kingston broken down in health and died 
there in 1836. Of the early days of young Macdonald little need be said 
more than that they were spent around the romantic shores of the beautiful Bay 
ofQuinte. At the age of fifteen, after such common-school education as 
those early days aftbrded, and a brief career at the Kingston Grammar School, 
he had to leave school in order to help in the support of the family, and 
commence to fight his way up to an eminence not hitherto attained by any 
Colonial statesman. Choosing the profession of law, he entered as a student 
the office of Mr. George Mackenzie of Kingston, being called to the Bar in 
1836 when he was twenty-one. He immediately commenced to practise his 
profession in Kingston. His office was but a few months opened when there 
came as a student to him a lad named Oliver Mowat, and subsequently 
another named Alexander Campbell, and it is often thought of as a remarkable 
fact that the three young men thus associated in their early days should all 
have become eminent in Canadian politics, and each be knighted by her 
Majesty for services to the Empire. Sir Alexander Campbell, after a lengthy 
career as a member of the Government of Canada, passed away while holding 
the position of Lieutenant-Governor of Ontario. Sir Oliver Mowat, after the 
unparalleled record of nearly a quarter of a century, uninterruptedly, in the 
Premiership of Ontario, contributed largely to the final success of his party in 
Dominion politics by joining them in that arena, becoming for a brief time 
Minister of Justice on the formation of the Laurier Cabinet, afterward 
spending his declining years as Lieutenant-Governor of his native Province 
Meanwhile the one-time tutor in law of the other two had gone to his rest after 
a public career of nearly half a century, during which he had achieved a 
prominence, not only in Canada but in the Empire at large, such as no other 
British statesman outside the British Isles had ever attained. 



370 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

Many stories are yet told by the old inhabitants of Kingston of the- 
young lawyer, whose genial ways, added to his cleverness, had early won b m 
popularity and business. But the chief incident of his legal career was tl e 
defence of Von Shoultz for his participation in the rebellion of 18?T-8, or 
rather in the raid from the United States which took place in connection wiih 
it. A number of misguided Americans, who imagined that they had onl} t, ^) 
show themselves on Canadian soil to be joined by a population groan i g 
under oppression and ready to cast off the yoke of the British, made a diish 
across the St, Lawrence, took possession of a windmill near Prescott, and 
kept it for several days till surrounded by the British forces. Von Shoultz, 
a young Polish gentleman, who too late regretted having been misled, was, 
with other leaders, tried by court-martial for the offence and was defended 
by Mr. Macdonald. There was not much chance for defence, as Von Shoultz 
pleaded guilty, and, with nine others, suffered the extreme penalty of the 
law, but his connection with the case added to the rising fame of the young 
lawyer. With such stirring events taking place in Canada, it was natural 
that a young man poss^sed of the double qualifications of talent and 
ambition should turn his attention to politics, and the zest for a political 
career was heightened by the seat of Government, at that time itinerant, 
being moved to Kingston in 1841. Although he had served as Alderman 
for Frontenac Ward in the Kingston City Council, it was not till 1844, when 
the Draper Ministry — succeeding to office when Messrs. Baldwin and 
Lafontaine had resigned on account of their quarrel with the Grovernor, Sir 
Charles Metcalfe — appealed to the people, that Mr. Macdonald entered the 
political arena. In the general election he consented to contest Kingston 
against Mr. Manahan. He entered political life as a Torj What afterwards 
became known as the Liberal-Conservative party, resulting from a fusion of 
factions, and practically the creation of Mr. Macdonald himself, had no 
existence at that time. 

It would be unjust to the memory of the Reformers of those days to say 
that any considerable portion of them favoured a severance of Canada from 
the British Empire; but the Provinces had recently passed through a 
rebellion in which foreigners from the United States had been invited to an 



THE RIGHT HON. SIR JOHN A. MACDONALD. 371 

armed invasion of Canada, and the feelings evoked had not yet died away. 
Of the staunch loyalty of Mr. Baldwin there could be no question, but most 
of those who favored the rebellion, and some who had made no secret of their 
fondness for Republican institutions, attached themselves to the party led by 
him, and, as often happens, the party was judged by the public, and 
especially by its opponents, from its extreme men rather than from its 
leaders. Although singular, it is therefore not at all surprising that the 
same sentiment which dominated his whole political career, and found vent 
in the memorable words of his last manifesto to the people of Canada, should 
be found in the foreground of Mr. Macdonald's first address to the electors of 
Kingston, when he declared that : " The prosperity of Canada depends upon 
its permanent connection with the Mother-Country, and I will resist to the 
utmost any attempt (from whatever quarter it may come) which may tend to 
weaken that union." Having gained a seat in the Assembly, Mr. Macdonald 
seems in his early sessions to have applied himself more to the study of 
constitutional and current questions than to making himself conspicuous by 
speaking. But, in view of the recently revived question of differential duties, 
it is interesting to note that in the session of 1846 he spoke strongly on a 
resolution for differential duties in favour of Great Britain, contending that: 
" The danger to our markets is not from British but American manufactures ; 
and while British manufactures coming through the United States must, of 
course, pay the high duty, coming by the St. Lawrence they will pay an 
ad valorem duty of five per cent., and if honourable gentlemen wish the 
country to enjoy that protection they must vote with the Ministry." 

Although he was not making himself conspicuous, the young membei 
was nevertheless attracting the attention of his leaders, and in 1846 Mr. 
Draper expressed a strong desire that Mr. Macdonald should join the 
Ministry, although it was not till 1847 that he took his first Ministerial 
position, that of Receiver-General. Mr. Draper went on the Bench soon 
after, and the Government, after carrying through the session on a narrow 
majority, were defeated at the general election in December of that year. 
The most notable event in the history of the second Lafontaine-Baldwin 
Ministry, which followed, was the introduction of a Bill in the session of 1849 



372 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

for the indemnification of persons in Lower Canada whose property had beec 
destroyed in the Rebellion of 1837-38. The cry was at once raised that it 
was proposed to compensate rebels as well as loyal citizens, and the feeling 
it evoked, especially among the English-speaking population of the Lower 
Province was intense. Although fought bitterly by the Conservative 
Opposition, Mr. Macdonald, amongst others, speaking against it, the Bill was 
carried by a large majority. The excitement of the populace culminated 
when Lord Elgin came to the House, then sitting in Montreal, to give assent 
to the Bill. He was received with hootings and his carriage pelted with 
missiles as he drove away. Nor did the excitement end there, for in the 
evening the rising tide carried the mob to the Assembly, where the doors 
were forced, the members dispersed, and the furniture smashed. Someone 
applied a torch to the edifice, and by morning the Parliament buildings 
were a smoking ruin. Though temporary premises were secured and the 
session hastily brought to a close, this mob violence lost the seat of 
Government to Montreal. A number of other cities were bidding for it, and 
Mr. Macdonald moved that Kingston be the location, but a removal to 
Toronto was decided upon, and the Legislature alternated between that city 
and Quebec every four years till 1865. 

In the latter part of 1851, the Hon. Mr. Baldwin having retired because 
he found himself in a minority from Upper Canada, although the majority of 
the whole House agreed with him in opposing a bill to abolish the Court of 
Chancery, and the Hon. Mr. Lafontaine also retiring from public life, the 
Hon. Francis Hincks was called upon to re-organize the Ministry. Although 
Sir Allan McNab was the nominal leader of the Conservatives, Mr. 
Macdonald was recognized as the moving spirit of the party, and he found an 
effective ally in the Hon. George Brown in his efforts to oust the Reform or 
Liberal Ministry. It is a noteworthy fact that although for nearly thirty 
years this gentleman was the most bitter and powerful opponent Mr, 
Macdonald had, the Conservative leader on more than one occasion gained a 
victory by turning to account the quarrels of his forceful antagonist with his 
own party friends. Mr. Brown, who was a man of strong feelings and 
more than ordinary vigour^ had through his newspaper, The Globe, been 



TKiS RIGHT HON. SIR JOHN A. MACDONALD. 873 

working up public sentiment in Upper Canada to demand tlie secularizatioD 
of the Clergy lleserves, and he now came out in pronounced hostility to the 
Hincks-Morin Ministry. The Imperial Parliament in 1853 empowered the 
Canadian Parliament to deal with the question, and when, in 1854, the 
Houses met without reference in the Speech to the matter, or to the other 
burning question in Lower Canada of the abolition of Seigneurial Tenure, an 
amendment was moved regretting that there was no reference to the 
settlement of these questions. It was of no avail that Mr. Hincks was known 
to be in favour of Secularization, and, if given time, would undoubtedly have 
dealt with it. Mr. Brown and his friends joined hands with the Tory 
Opposition, and the Government was defeated by 42 to 29. The Ministry 
immediately brought down the Governor to prorogue the House — an unique 
proceeding in Parliamentary government, as no Act had been passed, and 
the passing of one was necessary to constitute a session. 

A dissolution and general election followed immediately, and when the 
House met in September, Mr. Brown and his followers again made common 
cause with the Conservatives in order to defeat the Government, which in a 
few days was forced to resign. Sir Allan McNab as leader of the regular 
Opposition was called upon to form a Ministry, but found himself in a difficult 
position, as his followers numbered not quite a third of the House, while those 
of the late Ministry exceeded either one of the parties opposed to them. It was 
here that the genius of Mr. Macdonald for solving difficulties, so often to be 
tested in the future, came into play. He saw that the Moderate Reformers of 
Lower Canada were irreconcilably opposed to Mr. George Brown and those 
who acted with him, and he made overtures resulting in M. Morin and his 
colleagues in the Lower Canada wing of the late Government joining the new 
Ministry. Mr. Hincks, although he did not join the Government, gave his 
assent to the arrangement, and a couple of his Upper Canada friends were 
taken in. This coalition marks the formation of what has ever since been 
known in Canada as the Liberal-Conservative party. The elections having 
shown unmistakably the feelings of the people, the defeated Government had 
announced in the Speech from the Throne measures for the abolition of 
Seigneurial Tenure and for the secularization of the Clergy Reserves. 



S74 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

Practically the same programme was adhered to by the new Ministry. In 
October the Hon. Mr. Macdonald introduced a bill for the secularization of 
the Clergy Reserves, while the Hon, L. T. Drummond introduced one 
abolishing Seigneurial Tenure in Lower Canada- The two measures passed 
through the House concurrently, and thus were forever set at rest two great 
questions which had long agitated the Provinces. Mr. Brown and his 
followers were furious when they found that they had co-operated with the 
Conservatives in turning out a Reform Government only to find a coalition 
formed which left them in a hopeless minority, and after objecting to some 
of the details were found voting against the secularization measure when it 
eventually passed. 

Sir Allan McNab was too old and set in his ways to be the leader of a 
progressive party like that newly formed, and dissatisfaction soon sprang up, 
culminating in the defection of the Liberal wing of the Government and 
forcing a reconstruction in 1856, with the Hon. E. P. Tach6 in the Upper 
House as nominal Premier, while the Hon. John A. Macdonald as Leader in 
the Assembly was virtually in command. On the 25th November, 1857, 
Colonel Tache retired and Mr. Macdonald was at once asked by the Governor- 
General to form a Ministry, which he did, taking the Hon. George E. Cartier 
as Leader of the Lower Canadian section. A dissolution and general election 
immediately followed. At the union of the Provinces in 1840 each of them 
had been given an equal representation in Parliament, although Lower 
Canada had at that time the larger population. The more rapid growth of 
the Upper Province had, however, long placed it in the lead, and Mr. George 
Brown had for some time been agitating through The Globe and in 
Parliament, for representation according to population. He had also started 
an onslaught on Roman Catholic sectarian schools, and these two subjects 
formed the battle cries in Upper Canada, carrying it against the 
Government, although, as was natural with such questions in agitation, the 
Ministry gained a sweeping victory in Lower Canada. Although Mr, 
Macdonald saw clearly enough that with the rapidly increasing population of 
the Upper Province a re-adjustment of representation on the basis of 
population must eventually come, he took the ground that the arrangement 




THE RT. HON. SIR JOHN A. MACDONALD, G.C.B. 



THE RIGHT HON. 8IB JOHN A. MACDONATiD. 377 

of 1840 was in the nature of a compact which should not be disturbed without 
the consent ot both parties to it, and he was consequently placed in the 
trying position of having to govern the country while in a minority in his 
own Province. The cry of '* Lower Canadian domination " was therefore 
persistently and effectively hurled at him throughout Upper Canada. This 
was not without some compensating advantage, for it rallied to his side the 
people of Lower Canada and laid the foundation of that faithful attachment 
which made him in his after career, although a Protestant and resident of 
another Province, more powerful among the French and Catholic population 
than any of their own compatriots. 

It had been long felt that the perambulatory system for Parliament ought 
to be ended, and various attempts were made to fix upon some place as the 
permanent Seat of Government where suitable buildings could be erected. 
But local jealousies defeated every attempt, till in 1857 the Legislature 
referred the question to Her Majesty. In 1858 her decision was given in 
favour of Ottawa, and such an opportunity being one not to be overlooked in 
party warfare, a resolution was moved that Ottawa ought not to be the 
Seat of Government. Although it was opposed by the Ministry, who felt 
bound to stand by Her Majesty's decision, the motion rallied the local 
influences of the other aspiring cities, and these combined with the regular 
Liberal Opposition, carried it by 64 to 50. Mr. George Brown immediately 
said that this was a condemnation of the Government and to test it he would 
move the adjournment of the House. The test was accepted by the Ministry, 
and they were sustained by a vote of 50 to 61. But Mr. Macdonald saw that 
he would put his opponent in an unpopular position if they took office on a 
programme of opposition to Her Majesty's decision after she had been invited 
to give it, and next day, on the assembling of the House, announced the 
resignation of the Ministry. Mr. Brown was asked to form a Government, 
and undertook the task, taking Mr. A. A. Dorion as his colleague for Lower 
Canada, and completing his Ministry on the 2nd of August. Immediately 
the announcement was made in the House, on the usual motion for a writ for 
a new election for one of the seats vacated by the acceptance of office, Mr. H. L. 
Langevin moved to add that the new Ministry did not possess the confidence 



378 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

of the House or the country. As the new Ministers were out of the House, 
and could not speak for themselves, the members of the late Ministry 
refrained from speaking, but the amendment was carried by the decisive vote, 
of 71 to 31, a majority of each Province voting against the Government. Mr. 
Brown then applied for a dissolution, which was refused, the Governor- 
General having warned him before taking office that a dissolution would not 
be granted, and the Brown-Dorion Ministry resigned on the 4th August after 
having lasted only two days. The Governor asked Mr. (afterwards Sir 
Alexander) Gait to form a Ministry, but he declined, and the Hon. George E. 
Cartier was then sent for. He asked Mr. Macdonald to help him, and practically 
the old Ministry, with a change of offices, came back to power. 

And now took place a transaction which has passed into history under 
the name of the "double shuffle," and which gave rise to many bitter 
discussions at the time. The rule under the British Parliamentary system 
being that members accepting Cabinet offices thereby vacate their seats and 
must be re-elected, the members of the Brown-Dorion Ministry were out of 
the House and seeking re-election. But it was discovered that the law 
provided that a member resigning one Cabinet position and accepting 
another within thirty days need not be re-elected ; so the members of the old 
Government took temporarily other offices than they had formerly occupied, 
and then, changing back into their old positions, went on with the work of 
Parliament without the trouble of personal re-election. The effect of this 
move on their opponents need hardly be described. They were furious in 
finding out how they had been outwitted, the only result of the adverse vote 
by which they defeated the Government having been to put themselves out 
of the House and to make new elections necessary, while the members of the 
old Government, re-installed in office, were calmly going on with the business 
of the House. Mr. Brown and his colleagues, with their followers, made the 
country ring with denunciations of the " double shuffle." They afterwards 
brought the matter up in the House, which sustained the Government, and 
carried it to the courts, where it was decided that the course pursued had 
been quite constitutional. 



THB RIGHT HON. SIR JOHN A. MACDONALD. 879 

The general election of 1861 presented the spectacle of Mr. Macdonald 
and his former student, Mr. Oliver Mowat, pitted against each other at the 
polls. Mr. Mowat, being a native of Kingston, and with extensive 
connections there, the Liberals thought that his candidacy would give a 
chance of defeating Mr. Macdonald, who, however, won an easy victory. 
The danger of war with the United States over the Trent Affair in 1861 
having made- painfully apparent the defenceless position of the country had 
war unfortunately ensued, the Ministry, in consultation with the Imperial 
authorities, devised a scheme of defence, including fortifications, and brought 
it before Parliament in the Militia Bill of 1862. But objection was taken, 
especially by the Lower Canadians, to the expense, and the Government was 
defeated — although Mr. Macdonald had the satisfaction of knowing that he 
was sustained by a majority of seven votes from his own Province. The 
Ministry having resigned, the Governor sent for Mr. John Sandfield 
Macdonald, who, in conjunction with Mr. Sicotte, from Lower Canada, 
formed a Government. Although Mr. Sandfield Macdonald was of the same 
political party, he had from the start the bitter hostility of Mr. George 
Brown, who once more played into the hands of his old opponent, and so 
assailed the new Government, both personally and through The Globe, that 
it was defeated in a want of confidence Resolution moved by Mr. John A. 
Macdonald inMav,I863. The House was immediately dissolved, and an 
election brought on, but before the polling a general shuffle in the Ministry 
took place, securing the support of Mr. Brown through the elections. The 
Government obtained a small majority in the House, but was in a minority 
from Lower Canada, and therefore found it practically impossible to carry 
on business, although its resignation did not take place till March, 1864. 
The Provincial Secretary, Mr. Ferguson Blair, was called on and attempted 
to form a Government, but failed ; after which Sir E. P. Tach6, with the 
assistance of Mr. John A. Macdonald, got together a Ministry. But parties were 
so evenly balanced that it was impossible for either side to govern, and after 
struggling on lor a few weeks the new Ministry was, on the 14th of June, 
defeated by a vote of 60 to 58, thus bringing on the memorable deadlock, 
which partly led to the most important epoch in the history of Canada. 



880 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

Next day, while everybody was discussing what ought to be done in the 
emergency — two Ministries having fallen witiiin a few weeks, and it being 
manifest that another, if formed, would at once share the same fate — Mr. George 
Brown, in conversation with Mr. Alxander Morris, intimated his willingness to 
meet with his opponents and talk over the situation. He was immediately 
t;iken at his word. Mr. John A. Macdonald and Mr. A. T. Gait waited ou 
him at his hotel, and from that interview sprang what afterwards developed 
into the Dominion of Canada. The union of the four Provinces, 
consummated on the first of July, 1807, having led to such great results, 
there has been much controversy as to who should have tlie honour of being 
considered the " Fatlier of Confederation." In the sense of having first 
suggested it, it would be difficult to decide, for a union of the British North 
American colonies had been a dream of statesmen for a great many years, 
and had on various occasions been advocated in more or less definite form. 
But until this memorable meeting no practical step toward it had really 
been taken. History will record it to the credit of Mr. George Brown that at 
the critical juncture he sank his personal feelings, and came forward to co- 
operate with his opponents in a patriotic attempt to extricate the country from 
its difficulties — and neither friends nor opponents who remember the warm 
animosities he cherished, and know what an effort it must have cost him, 
will be sparing in their praise for his patriotic act. But when this interview 
took place it does not appear that Mr. Brown was prepared to take up the 
question of Confederation at once. Indeed the official memorandum shows 
that when Messrs. Macdonald and Gait proposed a Federal union of all the 
British North American Provinces as a remedy for the difficulty, he said that 
this would not be acceptable to the people of Upper Canada ; that though a 
Federal union was desirable, and would come eventually, it was remote ; and 
he proposed " Parliamentary reform, based on population, without regard to 
the separating line between Upper and Lower Canada." Messrs. Macdonald 
and Gait, sticking to their proposal, Mr, Brown acquiesced in its being tried, 
and although averse at first to entering the Government, finally came in with 
Messrs. William Macdougall and Oliver Mowat to help in carrying the 
scheme through. 



THE RlOnX HON. 81A JOHN A. MACDONALD. 

The important events which followed mark the greatest epoch in the 
history of Canada. It is necessary in a sketch such as the present to 
touch but liglitly upon them. A Convention having been called at 
Charlottetown to discuss a proposed union between Nova Scotia, New 
Brunswick and Prince Edward Island, a deputation from the Canadian 
Government attended, and took the Convention by storm with the great 
scheme they had to propose. It was subsequently considered at Quebec and 
resolutions passed with which eventually delegates from the different 
Provinces went to England and secured the passage of the British North 
America Act. Althougli great service was rendered by Messrs. Till&y of New 
Brunswick, Tupper of Nova Scotia, Cartier of Lower Canada, Macdougall of 
Upper Canada, and others whose names will always be illustrious in Canadian 
history for the part they took in these events, it is conceded on all sides that 
the one conspicuous figure throughout was that of John A. Macdonald. His 
was the directing mind and his tlie moulding hand which practically shaped 
the constitution of the Dominion of Canada. He was* knighted by Her 
Majesty, and when the Act took effect on the 1st of July, 1867, he had the 
honour of being called to be the first Premier of the Dominion. 

In the elections which followed Sir John had once more to meet the 

bitter opposition of Mr. George Brown, who had left the Government before 

Confederation was consummated. But notwithstanding this formidable 

obstacle, the Government carried Ontario, Quebec and New Brunswick by 

large majorities, although in Nova Scotia the Anti-Confederates made almost 

a clean sweep — Dr. Tupper being the only supporter returned from that 

Province. From this time till the next general election in 1872 were years 

of arduous labour, which might fairly be called an era of nation building. 

Never in a similar length of time has any other country made such strides in 

Territorial expansion as did Canada during that period. The machinery of 

the new Dominion had to be got under way, laws had to be devised and 

passed organizing the various departments of State, the Inter-colonial Railway 

had to be located and its construction proceeded with. Such works as these 

latter might have been considered sufficient to task the energies of Premier 

and Government for one Parliamentary term ; but Sir John started with 
21 



382 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

large conceptiong of the future in store for Canada and lost no time in setting 
to work to carry out his grand ideas. Steps were at once taken to acquire for 
the Dominion sovereignity over the vast British region which stretched 
westward from Ontario until it reached the Province of British Columbia on 
the Pacific, and northwards to the Arctic Ocean; and, after a substantial 
payment to extinguish the rights of the Hudson's Bay Company, this was 
achieved and a commencement of organization made for the new territory by 
erecting and admitting into Confederation the Province of Manitoba in 1870. 
British Columbia was next approached and brought into the Dominion in 1871, 
and then Prince Edward Island, which had held out when the original 
Union was being formed, was wooed and won in 1872 — ^thus completing 
Canadian sway from ocean to ocean and from the Great Lakes to the North 
Pole. 

Meanwhile a number of irritating questions had arisen between Great 
Britain and the United States, and Sir John had the honour of being selected, 
along with four British statesmen, as one of the Imperial Commissioners to 
arrange a settlement. It was the first time a Colonial statesman had ever 
been associated in treaty-making on behalf of the Empire. When he 
returned he had to encounter bitter criticism, not so much for what the 
Treaty of Washington contained, as for its failure to deal with subjects which 
Canada had a fair right to have considered, but he fought it through 
Parliament and left his vindication for the future. It has come since his 
death, for his letters to his colleagues published in Mr. Joseph Pope's Memoirs 
show how stoutly he contended for Canada's rights— being overborne by the 
other British Commissioners who for Imperial reasons did not wish to have 
Canada's claims pressed at that time. After the Treaty of Washington was 
ratified, Sir John was made an Imperial Privy Councillor in recognition of 
bis. great services to the Empire, being the first Colonial statesman upon whom 
that high honour had been conferred. One of the terms on which British 
Columbia had been admitted to the Union was that a railway across the 
continent, to connect the railway system of Canada with the Province on the 
Pacific coast, should be commenced and constructed within ten years. This 
was immediately assailed as the height of folly. British Columbia was 



THB RIGHT HOi^. 81K JOHN A. MAt'DONAIJJ. 883 

described as a •• 6oa of mountitUifj " ; it was said that from the Red River 
Valley eastward there was nothing but a succession of rocks and musKeg ; 
that the whole length of the line would be through an uninhabited wilderness ; 
that such an undertaking, which was enough to task the energies of an old 
and wealthy country, would certainly crush the new Dominion under a 
burden from which it could never recover ; that to undertake it for the sake 
of a few people on the Pacific Coast was sheer madness. Sir John, however, 
was not to be daunted. He believed that such a line would be the making 
of Canada, and with the help of his energetic colleague, Sir Charles Tupper, 
he resolutely went ahead. 

But while the greatest triumph of his life was connected with this 
magnificent work, perhaps the greatest trial of his career was associated with 
its early days. Parliament having decided that it would be preferable to have 
the Pacific Railway built by an incorporated company rather than by the 
Government direct. Sir Hugh Allan, of Montreal, and Hon. D. L. Macpherson, 
of Toronto, each promoted companies to undertake the work. When the 
elections of 1872 were over someone obtained access to the private 
correspondence of Sir Hugh Allan's solicitor. Based on the information 
which the Opposition was thus put in possession of, when the House met in 
1873, Mr. L. S. Huntington made a series of charges against the Government 
to the effect that they had sold the Charter for the Pacific Railway to Sir 
Hugh Allan for a large sum of money with which to carry on the elections. 
There was great excitement throughout the country, and the proceedings of 
the Royal Commission, consisting of Judges Day, Polette and Gowan, 
appointed to take evidence on the charges, were followed with intense interest. 
The charge that the Government had bartered the Pacific Railway Charter to 
Sir Hugh Allan was not sustained by the evidence — in fact it was shown that 
Sir John had refused to give the work to the Company promoted by Sir 
Hugh and had insisted that a new Company from which Sir Hugh's 
American associates were excluded should be formed out of the two. It was 
also proved that he had given Sir Hugh Allan no advantage over others. It 



384 BUILDEES OF CANADA. 

was, however, admitted that Sir Hugh, who was very wealthy and had great 
interests at stake in addition to his prospective interest in the Pacific Railway, 
(and felt that a change of Ministry would be disastrous to them), gave large 
sums of money in the elections to sustain the Government, and the fact of 
accepting such sums from a prospective public contractor raised a feeling 
that it was diflScult for the Ministry to stand up against. The House met in 
October to receive the evidence and a fierce debate ensued. Sir John did not 
wait for a vote, but after one of the most spirited speeches he ever delivered, 
tendered the resignation of the Ministry and vacated office. 

The Hon. Alexander Mackenzie was called on to form a Government, 
and securing a dissolution, carried the country by a very large majority. It 
was not long, ho\Yever, till the rising tide of Sir John's popularity began 
again to manifest what a wonderful hold he had upon the public of Canada, 
and the movement was accelerated by a new element which now came into 
Canadian politics. The low tariff of Canada, which had been a sufficient 
protection while the industries of the United States were handicapped by the 
War of the Rebellion, now^ offered little obstacle to the traders of the latter 
country flooding the Canadian market with their surplus of manufactured and 
natural products whenever it suited them to do so — whilst the Canadian 
products were religiously excluded from the United States markets by a high 
tariff. Strong representations were made to the Government that this w^as 
unfair to Canadian manufacturers and agriculturists, who ought to be 
afforded some protection against the inroads of their Southern neighbors. 
But Mr. Mackenzie was a free-trader who had the courage to stand by his 
convictions, and he refused to yield to appeals made by his own political 
friends, as well as by his opponents. Sir John, as leader of the Opposition, 
voiced the popular demand by resolutions which he introduced into the 
House. They were voted down, but when the elections came in September, 
1878, he w^as once more returned to power by an overwhelming majority, and 
on October 17 ensuing, his Cabinet was duly announced. 

The following statement gives the Ministry, as it existed, with occasional 
change, until the death of the Premier on June 6, 1891 : 



-7 ^fmpy%^ 




THE HON. SIR RICHARD J. CARTWRIGHT, G.C.M.G. 



THE RIGHT HON. SIR JOHN A. MACDONALD. 



887 



OFFICE 

Premier 

Minister of Justice 



Minister of Finance 

Minister of Public Works 
Minister of Railways and Canals 

Minister of Militia and Defence 



Minister of Customs 
Minister of Agriculture 

Postmaster-General 



Minister of Marine and Fisheries 



Minister of Inland Revenue 



Minister of Interior 



President of the Council 



Jteceiver-General 
Secretary of State 



NAME 

Rt. Hon. Sir John Macdonald 

Hon. James Macdonald 

Hon. Sir Alexander Campbell 

Hon. Sir John Thompson 

Hon. Sir S. h. Tilley 

Hon. A. W. McLellan 

Hon. Sir Charles Tupper 

Hon. George E. Foster 

Hon. Sir Charles Tupper 

Hon. Sir Hector L. Langevin 

Hon. Sir Charles Tupper 

Hon. J. H. Pope 

Rt. Hon. Sir John Macdonald 

Hon. ly. F. R. Masson 

Hon. Sir Alexander Campbell 

Hon. Sir Adolph Caron 

Hon. Mackenzie Bowell 

Hon. J. H. Pope 

Hon. John Carling 

Hon. Sir Hector L. Langevin 

Hon. Sir Alexander Campbell 

Hon. John O'Connor 

Hon. Sir Alexander Campbell 

Hon. John O'Connor 

Hon. John Carling 

Hon. Sir Alexander Campbell 

Hon. A. W. McLellan 

Hon. John Haggart 

Hon. J. C. Pope 

Hon. A. W. McLellan 

Hon. George E. Foster 

Hon. C. H. Tupper 

Hon. L. F. G. Baby 

Hon. J, C. Atkins 

Hon. John Costigan 

Rt. Hon. Sir John Macdonald 

Hon. Sir D. 1,. Macpherson 

Hon. Thomas White 

Hon. Edgar Dewdney 

Hon. John O'Connor 

Hon. Iv. F. R. Masson 

Hon. Joseph A. Mousseau 

Hon. A. W. McLellan 

Rt. Hon. Sir John Macdonald 

Hon. C. C. Colby 

Hon. Sir Alexander Campbell 

Hon. J. C. Aitkins 



DATE OF 
APPOINTMENT 



Oct. 
Oct. 
May 20 
Sept. 25 
Oct. 17 
Dec. 10 
Jan. 27 
May 29 
Oct, 
May 20 
May 20 
Sept. 25 
Nov. 28, 
Oct. 
Jan. 
Nov. 
Oct. 
Oct. 
Sept. 25 
Oct. 19, 
May 20| 
Jan. 16 
Nov. 8 
May 20, 
May 23 
Sept. 25 
Jan. 17 
Aug. 
Qct. 
July 
Dec. 
May 31 
Oct. 26, 
Nov. 8 
May 23 
Oct. 17 
Oct. 
Aug. 
Aug. 
Oct. 
Jan. 
Nov. 
May 20, 
Oct. 17 
Nov. 28, 
Nov. 8, 
Oct 19, 



S78 
881 
885 



887 
888 
878 

879 
879 
885 
889 



880 
878 



879 
880 
880 
881 
882 
885 
887 



882 
885 
888 
878 
880 
882 
878 



878 
880 
880 
881 
883 
889 
878 
878 



388 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

DATS OV 
NAMS APPOINTMENT 

Hou. John O'Connor Nov. 8, iSSo 

Hon. Joseph A. Mousseau May 20, 18S1 

Hon, J. A. Chapleau July 29, 1S82 

Without offic* Hon. R. D. Wilmot Nov. 8, 187S 

Hon. Sir David Macpherson Feb. 11, 18S0 

Hon. Frank Smith Jnly. 29, 1SS2 

Hon. J. J. C. Abbott May 13, 1SS7 

The carrying out of the promise to protect Canadian industries was the 
first work undertaken after the elections and in the Session of 1879 Sir 
Leonard Tilley, as Finance Minister, introduced the tariff which has since 
become known as the National Policy, and which, though strongly assailed, 
was sustained at three successive general elections thereafter — ^in fact as long 
as Sir John lived. 

Efforts to get capitalists to undertake the construction ot the Pacific 
Railway having failed, the Mackenzie Government had gone on with 
portions of the line as a Government work, bvit it had made slow progress. 
Sir John having redeemed his promise as to Protection now went resolutely 
to work on the great project he had so much at heart, and in 1880, with his 
energetic Minister of Railways, Sir Charles Tupper, and the Hon. J. H. Pope, 
he visited England, and succeeded in forming a syndicate of capitalists to 
undertake the work. The contract allowed ten years for its completion, but 
so vigorously was it pushed that in 1885 Sir John had the pleasure of going 
with Lady Macdonald across the continent to the Pacific coast on the great 
Canadian highway, thus realizing the completion of his great ambition. 

The tariff question was the great issue of the elections of 1882 and 1887, 
but after the latter a new element was imported into it by an agitation 
eoininciiced by Mr. Erastus Wiman, of New York, for commercial union, or 
unrestricted reciprocity, between Canada and the United States. In company 
with a member of Congress, who was also enthusiastic for the scheme, Mr. 
Wiman visited Canada and held meetings throughout the country. The 
project was endorsed by a number of the leading members of the Opposition, 
and a propaganda was started, aided by a powerful combination in the press, 
which was making such headway that it was felt there was danger of the 
country being carried if vigorous measures were not taken to counteract it 



THE RIGHT HON. SIR JOHN A. MACDONALD. JJSy 

Sir John believed that the success of this project would inevitably lead to the 
absorption of Canada in the American union ; and though more than three 
quarters of a century had passed over his head, and his life had been one ot 
continuous and arduous labor, he felt that the supreme effort of his career had 
now to be made. Early in 1891 he obtained a dissolution, issued a stirring 
address to the people of Canada, — one phrase of which, " A British subject I 
was born ; a British subject I will die," became the rallying cry of the 
campaign — and went into the fight with a vigour which surprised everybody, 
and which could not have been exceeded in his younger days. Two and 
sometimes three meetings per day were addressed, with additional talks from 
the rear platform of cars to excited crowds at railroad stations. Even on 
Sundays, when friends urged him to take a much needed rest, he kept two 
secretaries busy all day by dictating letters to them. When the voting came 
on 5th March, he scored a triumph which everybody admitted was due to his 
personal efiforts and popularity ; but it was a triumph purchased with his life. 
Although completely exhausted by the labours of the campaign, he went 
right on with the preparations to meet Parliament, which he did on 29th 
April, and for three weeks kept up the strain as Leader of the House. But 
exhausted nature could stand it no longer, and after one or two premonitory 
symptoms, in the last week in May the country was thrown into consternation 
by the news that he had been stricken with paralysis from which there was 
little hope that he would recover. Then followed ten days of anxiety, shared 
not by the people of Canada alone, but throughout the whole British Empire, 
from all quarters of which came sympathetic enquiries — daily joined in by Her 
Majesty the Queen through the Governor-General. On the 4th of June 
physicians in attendance reported slightly more favorable symptoms, but 
notwithstanding this he continued to sink, and near midnight on the 6th of 
June, without having regained consciousness he passed peacefully away. 
Messages of condolence poured in from Canada, from India, and from the 
leading statesmen of the Empire, and from the Queen, who showed her 
appreciation by causing a wreath of white roses to be placed on his coffin with 
the inscription : " From Her Majesty Queen Victoria, in memory of her 
faithful and devoted servant" The impressive scenes of the national funeral, 



890 BUILDEES OF CANADA. 

both at Ottawa and Kingston, were such as will never be forgotten by thobb 
who witnessed them. Not alone was it an immense concourse poured in 
from all parts of Canada to pay their last token of respect to the dead 
Chieftain, but it was a touching tribute to the personal character of Sir John 
and the never varying kindness and consideration with which he had treated 
all with whom he came in contact ; and which won him such a place in 
the affections of the people ; that thousands in all stations in life and from all 
parts of Canada, who saw him laid to rest in Cataraqui Cemetery, felt that 
they were taking leave not merely of a great statesman but of a warm personal 
friend whose memory they would long cherish. 

The newspapers of the United States joined with those of Canada and 
Great Britain in tributes to the dead statesman, in which former opponents 
freely recognized the great work he had done — the Chicago Herald epitomising 
the general voice of the press when it said : " With Sir John Macdonald's 
death passes away one of the most heroic figures of the time. He was a born 
leader of men, a shaper of policies, and a maker of history 1 Rarely, if ever, 
has the career of a single statesman been to a nation what the career of Sir John 
Macdonald was to Canada. He entered public life with the provinces numeri- 
cally weak, with undeveloped resources and torn by internal dissensions, 
and he did not lay down his charge till he had seen dissensions largely 
healed; British power on the American continent consolidated from the Atlantic 
to the Pacific and from the Great Lakes to the Arctic Ocean ; the great 
natural resources of this vast region rapidly developing ; a deep system of 
waterways penetrating from the Atlantic to the heart of the continent almost 
completed for large vessels ; Canada standing high among the nations of the 
world for its merchant marine ; and a magnificent highway across the 
continent, the building of which challenged the admiration of the world, and 
which is destined more and more to become the great line of communication 
between Europe and the Orient. That others from time to time took their 
parts and are entitled to share in the credit for what has been accomplished 
may be freely conceded, but history will record that to the energy, genius and 
guidance of Sir John Macdonald is Canada pre-eminently indebted for tke 
position she occupies to-day. 



THE RIGHT HON. SIR JOHN A. MACDONALD. 391 

After the funeral Her Majesty sent an autograph letter of sympathy to 
Lady Macdonald, announcing to her that she desired to confer some honour 
to mark her appreciation of Sir John's services to the Empire, which she did 
by elevating his widow to the Peerage with the title of Baroness Macdonald 
of EarnsclifiFe. A memorial service was held in Westminster Abbey, 
attended by the most eminent British statesmen, and subsequently a bust of 
Sir John was placed in St, Paul's Cathedral, amongst those of the great men 
of the Empire, and unveiled by Lord Rosebery with fitting ceremonies. 
Besides the monument erected by the Dominion on the Parliament grounds 
at Ottawa, Hamilton, Toronto, Montreal and Kingston also erected 
monuments to his memory, and in Toronto the annual decoration of the 
monument, with addresses commemorative of the work he accomplished, 
has been started, and constitutes an example which is being followed in other 
citie*. 



OHAPTER XXV. 

HON. ALEXANDER MACKENZIE. 

Alexander Mackenzie the First Great Liberal Premier of Canada — Of Typical Scotch 
Parentage — A Toiler from His Earliest Days — Apprenticed as a Stone-Cutter — In the 
Land of Bums — Joins the Baptist Communion — Decides to Emigrate to Canada — Arrives 
at Quebec on the "Monarch" — Decides to Locate at Kingston — At Work as a Builder — 
Cheated out of His Summer's Wages — A Winter in the Back Woods — A Contractor and 
Foreman on Public Works — Marries Helen Neil — Makes His Home in Sarnia — Death of 
His Wife — Takes an Interest in Politics — Editor of the "Lambton Shield" — Marries Jane 
Sym — Elected to Parliament — An Able Debater — Prophesies Evil to Liberals from the 
Formation of the Coalition Government — Takes Part in the Confederation Debates — His 
Prophesies Fulfilled — Advocates Vigorous Policy in the North West Rebellion of 1870 — 
Provincial Treasurer of Upper Canada — The Campaign of '72 — The "Pacific Scandal" — Mr. 
Mackenzie Called on to Form an Administration — His Campaign — His Career as Premier 
— Visits Scotland — Sir Charles Tupper's National Policy — The Election of '78 — 
In Opposition — Feels Deeply the Death of George Brown — In Poor Health — Once More 
Visits the Old World — Mr. Laurier Becomes I,eader of the Liberal Party — Death of 
Alexander Mackenzie. 

The career of Alexander Mackenzie, the first great Liberal Premier of 
Canada, admirably illustrates how the humblest citizen of this country may 
rise to the most exalted position in the gift of the nation. 

Like many others of the leading men of Canada, such as Sir John A. 
Macdonald, George Brown and Lord Strathcona, he was of Scotch parentage. 
He was the son of Alexander Mackenzie and Mary Stewart Fleming, and was 
born at Logierait on Monday, January 28, 1822. His father, a carpenter and 
ship-joiner by trade, was, during the greater part of his life, in poor 
circumstances, and, to provide for his numerous family, was forced to move 
from place to place in his native land in search of work. After the birth of 
his son Alexander, and before his death in 1836, he had been a resident of 
Perth, of Pitlochary and Dunkeld. He was a typical Scotch father, the 
father immortalized in Burns' Cottar's Saturday MgJd, and it was from him 
that his son inherited much of his austerity of character and high sense of 
right His mother was of superior family ; her father had been destined for 
392 



HON. ALEXANDER MACKENZIE. 393 

the army, but seems to have had no liking for the calling and settled dowL 
in a remote part of Scotland, where he acted as schoolmaster and session clerk. 
No doubt the future Premier of Canada inherited from his grandfather 
on his mother's side that intellectual power that early made him one of the 
ablest public men in Canada, and that literary grace which makes the 
descriptive passages in his letters such interesting reading. 

The early life of Alexander Mackenzie was like that of hundreds of 
other Scotch lads who 'have become distinguished in business, in politics and 
in literature. As soon as he was able he had to assist in earning the 
daily bread for the family, and when but ten years old we find him on the 
hillside employed as a herd-laddie. This work, of course, he did only in the 
summer season and in the winter months he attended school. When but 
thirteen j^ears old he left school altogether. His early life was one of labor, 
and at sixteen he worked in the fields at the plow. 

On account of the circumstances of his family and his environment, 
however ambitious he may have been, he could not hope to enter any of the 
learned professions. A mere day-laborer he would not be, and so he 
apprenticed himself to John Ireland, of Dunkeld, as a stone-cutter. Thus the 
man who was to be one of the builders of the Dominion began his life in 
earnest as a hewer of stone for the bridges and dwellings of his native land. 
His brothers were likewise to be workers; Robert and Hope became 
carpenters and cabinet-makers, John a tin and coppersmith and Adam a 
druggist. Alexander made rapid progress at his trade, and in 1841, before 
he had reached his twentieth birthday we find him at Irvine employed as a 
journeyman stone-cutter. 

He was now in the region that Burns had immortalized, and the 
inspiration of his surroundings and a somewhat close study of many of the 
poet's immortal verses did much to shape his character. Burns' love of 
nature. Burns' sympathy with the poor, Burns' passion for Liberty took 
possession of him. It was about this time, too, that he began to take an 
interest in the history of his country, and in the great movements that were 



394 BUILDEES OF CANADA. 

stirring the nation. He was in sympathy with the Chartists, and took part 
in some of their debates, but was never an extremist, and disapproved of 
many of the tactics of the leaders in the movement. 

From boyhood Alexander Mackenzie was, in religious matters, broad- 
minded and tolerant. He was a Presbyterian by birth, but while at Irvine 
was in daily contact with a number of earnest Baptists and under their 
influence joined the Baptist Church. No doubt, the cold austerity of the 
Presbyterian Church of his time made him turn for spiritual communion to 
this newer and more liberal-minded body, but he ever had an affection for the 
Church of his boyhood days, and towards the end of his life this affection 
seems to have increased. 

The young stone-mason spent only a short year at Irvine, but in that 
year the whole course of his future life was shaped- his mind was aroused by 
his study of Burns in the land of Burns ; he began to take an interest in the 
great social and political questions of his time ; and here he got his religious bent 
Here, too, he fell in with a family by the name of Neil. The father and 
eldest son were stone-cutters, and he formed a strong friendship with them, 
but a still stronger friendship with Helen Neil, a Scotch lass but seventeen 
years old. 

The Neils were dissatisfied with their lot in the Old World. Work could 
not always be obtained and when obtained the laborer's wage was barely 
sufficient to support life. At that time Canada was attracting a good deal of 
attention in Scotland, and the Neils thought they might better their condition 
by going to the New World. As soon as they had definitely concluded to 
pursue this course Alexander Mackenzie determined to accompany them, 
attracted, no doubt, by the opportunities the New World would present to his 
ambitious spirit, but also drawn across the Ocean by the magnet, Helen Neil. 
The party took passage on the ship " Monarch," sailing from Greenock, and 
after a voyage of a month's duration arrived safely in the St. Lawrence. 

Alexander Mackenzie had been a reader and knew something of the 
history of the country he was about to make his home, and when the 
" Monarch " touched at Quebec he visited the points of interests in that 
historic old city ; saw where the great battle of the Plains of Abraham had been 




THE HON. ALEXANDER MACKENZIE 



HON. AI.KX- ANDH-R MACKENZIE. 397 

fought, where Wolfe fell, and, from the rugged height, drank in the beauty of 
the majestic river and the grandeur of the mighty hills along its banks. The 
few hours he remained at Quebec made him a Canadian, and he ever after 
had an affectionate regard for the country where he was making his permanent 
home. On May 6 he reached Montreal. He was offered work in that city, 
but the wages were not as high as he expected, and, as he learned that 
building operations were being carried on on an extensive scale in what was 
then the western part ot Canada, he decided to proceed to the region of the 
Great Lakes. He seems now to have been the leading spirit in the Neil party, 
and it was he who made arrangements with the captain of a batteau to take 
the family to Kingston. 

When he reached Kingston he found that work was not as well 
remunerated as he had anticipated, and that living was much more expensive 
than in the eastern part of Canada ; however, he had to make the best of the 
situation and looked about for employment. He found that the tools he had 
brought with him were too soft to work the hard stone used in Kingston and 
he was not rich enough to buy a new set. However, he could not remain 
idle and engaged himself as a builder, and a proficient one he made. He 
worked industriously through his first summer in Canada, but had the 
misfortune to be swindled out of almost his entire pay. Towards the end of 
the summer he received a promissory note for his wages from the contractor 
for whom he worked, and had the pleasure of keeping that note to the end of 
his life. 

He was disheartened by his first experience, but determined to make an 
effort in a new line. Like many another young Scotchman, seeking wealth 
in America, he believed that if he owned a little farm he might be able 
in time to become a rich landed proprietor. Mr. Mowat, the father of Sir Oliver 
Mowat, took an interest in the young stone-mason, who had been cheated 
out of his hard-earned wages, and hearing of his desire for a farm offered 
him one on liberal terms about twenty-two miles from Kingston. It was in 
A thick woods ; indeed in the heart of the forest primeval. On it was a log 



398 BUILDERS OP CANADA. 

house sixteen by eighteen feet, and only about two acres of the surrounding 
land were cleared. To this rough, backwoods home Alexander Mackenzie 
and the Neil family moved early in the autumn of 1842. 

Never was a party less fitted to succeed under the hard conditions that 
forest farming in Canada presented. Mr. Steed, Neil's son-in-law, was a 
ship-carpenter, with no experience in farming ; Hugh Neil had had from early 
life his mind fixed on the ministry, and knew even less of farming than 
Steed ; Alexander Mackenzie's experience had been with the sheep on the 
Scotch hillsides and following the plow in the field for a few brief months. 
The women of the party had never even seen a cow milked. However, they 
spent a pleasant winter, and managed to cut from six to eight acres of timber. 
Their evenings were spent by the roaring open fire-place, and while the cold 
winter winds whistled through the cracks in the roof and in the sides of their 
rude log-cabin, and the howling of the hungry wolves occasionally reached 
their ears, they called up reminiscences of the Old World, planned for the 
future, read Shakespeare, Byron and Burns, discussed a little philosophy, 
and, following their natural bent, much theology. But this one winter on a 
Canadian farm seems to have been suflScient for Mackenzie. 

In the following spring we find him back in Kingston seeking 
employment as a stone-cutter. Work was at that time in progress at Fort 
Henry, situated on a point of land jutting out into Lake Ontario immediately 
fronting Kingston. Contracts were being let, and young Mackenzie obtained 
one for building a bomb-proof arch at the fort. He had a busy summer 
working at his trade on this and other public works about the harbor. To 
this day the inhabitants of Kingston delight to point out to tourists stone 
work done by the man who was in time to become a great builder of 
Canada. In this same year his brother, Hope, who was likewise to achieve 
political distinction in the country, crossed the ocean and journeyed to 
Kingston, where he was successful in obtaining work as a carpenter, and 
labored at his trade for three years in the city. 

Alexander Mackenzie early made his influence felt with those with 
whom he came in ffontact. and, irvdeed, several of the leading men of Kingston 
looked upon him as a youth of more than ordinary ability and promise. 



HON. ALEXANDER MACKENZIE. 399 

From the first he took an active interest in the great questions that were, at 
that time, agitating the public. The secularization of the Clergy Reserves 
was a living question. He took a strong stand against the Clergy Reserves, 
and was as outspoken on this matter as he had been on the Chartist 
movement in Scotland. 

In the spring of 1844, as there was a lull in building 
operations in Kingston, Alexander Mackenzie looked elsewhere for 
employment. At this time the great public works necessary to the 
development of the interior of the country were in process of construction. 
The Lachine, Beauharnois and the Welland Canals needed skilled 
labor, and he had little difficulty in finding employment on the 
Beauharnois Canal, and, on account of his efficiency as a workman and his 
strength of character, was placed in charge of a gang of men. 

While working here he narrowly escaped death. A stone of more than a 
ton weight which was being lowered into place pinned him beneath it and 
badly crushed his leg and foot ; till the end of his life the injured limb never 
recovered its old strength. By this accident he was laid aside for several 
months, but on recovering proceeded west to the Welland Canal, where he 
was employed as a foreman on work being done there. The following winter 
he returned to Kingston and superintended workmen who were getting out 
stone for the Welland Canal in the quarries on Long Island, opposite the city. 
He was at this time a very ardent lover, and, in his anxiety to see his fiancee, 
frequently risked walking across the dangerous channel between Long Island 
and the mainland. On several occasions the ice broke under him and he 
narrowly escaped drowning. He had his reward, however, for in the spring 
of 1845, when he had just passed his twenty-third birthday, he was married 
to Helen Neil. 

There seems to have been a boom in government work about Kingston 
in 1846, and Alexander Mackenzie found employment as a foreman on the 
fortifications of Fort Henry and on the celebrated Martello towers that were 
being erected on points of vantage about the harbour. He was not, however, 
to remain long in Kingston. His services were in demand and he found 
employment on the canal basin that was being constructed in Montreal. It 



400 BUILDERS OP CANADA. 

is worthy of note that within four years after his arrival in this country he 
had been employed on the greatest of Canadian foriiiications outside oi 
Quebec, and on the three greatest public works attempted in the country up 
to that time — the Lachine, Beauharnois and Welland Canals. 

While he was at work in Montreal his brother Hope seems to have 
become dissatisJSed with Kingston. He saw but little chance of winning 
either fame or fortune in the sleepy old Limestone City. He turned his eyes 
westward and selected Sarnia as a suitable place for his permanent abode. 
When Alexander had concluded the task on which he was engaged at the 
Montreal canal basin, he and his wife, now an invalid, moved west to Sarnia, 
and with this town his life was associated until its end. As soon as the 
brothers had found a place in Canada that they determined to make their 
permanent home they thought of the other members of the family in Scotland 
and Hope journeyed to the Old World to induce them to come to this 
country and was successful in his mission. 

Alexander Mackenzie was soon to suffer the first great grief of his life. 
His wife while in Kingston had taken a fever from which she never 
completely recovered, and in 1852 she died. His life was greatly saddened by 
this calamity, and for a time he felt as though all the brightness had gone 
out of existence. Fortunately at this period of his career his mind was much 
occupied with public questions. From the time he landed in Canada he had 
taken an interest in the affairs of his adopted country. In Kingston he had 
been most outspoken on several of the questions stirring the political parties 
and had made enemies and friends. He was a pronounced Reformer, almost 
a Radical, and when he settled in Sarnia he entered energetically into the 
political life of the community. His ability as a speaker made him at once 
a leader in the Reform party of Kent and Lambton, and he was appointed 
secretary of the Reform Committee for these two counties. He was in this way 
brought before the notice of George Brown and the great leader of the Liberal 
party in Ontario recognized the strength of th« young stone-mason. A close 
intimacy was formed between the two which endured without a break until 
I'.rown was slain by the assassin, Bennett They had, indeed, much in 
oonimon ; both were typical Scotchmen, uncompromiFiing in ilieii' attitude 




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HON. ALEXANDER MACKENZIE. 401 

towards reform, the soul of honor and integrity, and despising political 
tricksters and corruption ists. To these two men, more than to any others, 
were due the ideals of the Liberal party which in these latter days have been 
so sadly departed from. 

Alexander Mackenzie was a great help to George Brown iu his 
election of 1851, both in his capacity as secretary of the Lambton 
Reform Committee and in his power as *a speaker and a writer. At 
this time the supporters of George Brown established the Lambton Shield. 
In 1852, Mr. Mackenzie became editor of this paper and proved himself a 
writer of considerable strength, with a good grip on public questions. He 
was, however, to have a short editorial career. In his vigorous method of 
handling public men he gave offence to the Hon. Malcolm Cameron, who 
entered an action for libel against the Lambton Shield with the result that the 
paper had to cease publication, and Mackenzie was the poorer by £150. 

The words in which he bade farewell to his readers admirably illustrate 
the difficulties under which he did his editorial work. 

"The editorial work connected with a weekly journal we have long 
found a serious encroachment on many of the evening hours of rest after 
spending the day in the exercise of some laborious manual labor. We leave 
the profession, as we entered it, with clean hands, and it was not because 
we had not the opportunity to follow the evil practices that we kept our 
hands clean in the management of a public journal. We deemed it a 
sacred duty to seek no man's favor, and to be regardless of any man's frown." 
Such as he here describes himself, he was to the end of his life. These 
farewell words attracted not a little attention ; and that hot-headed enthusiast 
for reform, William Lyon Mackenzie, who now heard of him for the first 
time, spoke of him as a man of large mental capacity and indomitable 
energy. 

That Alexander Mackenzie was able to forgive and forget was shown at 
the Reform convention which met at Strathroy in the summer of 1860. On 
that occasion Malcolm Cameron, through the support of Mr. Mackenzie, was 



402 BUILDEES OF CANADA. 

chosen to bear the banner of the Liberal party for Lambton and Kent, and 
Mr. Mackenzie's brilliant work had not a little to do with winning him the 
seat. These two distinguished men were ever after to be friends. 

Alexander Mackenzie's powers were rapidly developing. He had 
proved, in his editorial capacity on the Laimbton Shield, that he was able to 
write with vigor and intelligence. He was even more powerful as a speaker, 
and on one occasion in 1853 met Dr. Egerton Ryerson on the platform in a 
discussion on the reverend gentleman's public school policy, and, although 
Ryerson was recognized as one of the ablest political speakers of his time, the 
stone-mason had the better of the argument. 

In 1853 Alexander Mackenzie married Jane, eldest daughter of Mr. 
Robert Syra. Although now barely past thirty he was recognized as one of 
the leading citizens of Sarnia and took an active interest in the life of the 
town. His brother, Hope, seems to have made his mark, and in 1860 was 
chosen to represent Lambton on the retirement of Hon. Malcolm Cameron. In 
1861 Hope was renominated for Lambton but declined the offer, and Alexander 
was elected by a substantial majority. His address to the electors is ol 
interest ; it shows the principles that guided his early political career — 
principles from which he never departed. He strenuously advocated reform 
of the representation. He denounced the extravagance of the government 
and advocated economy and lower taxation. He deplored the fact that the 
debt of the country was increasing and that the expenditure was going up by 
leaps and bounds. He believed that the tariff should be lowered ; he 
denounced the erection of such works as bridges, piers, etc., for political 
support, and the giving of contract-s to members of parliament. His 
constituency was a widely scattered one but he had the physical strength that 
enabled him to make himself known in every part of it, even though he had 
to hold three meetings a day to reach all the electors. 

When the parliament met at Quebec the question of representation by 
population came up, and Alexander Mackenzie made his first speech before 
the country on tnis great issue. He, however, was not bound to representation 
by population, but inlormed the government that he was prepared to consider 
any other remedy they might suggest to meet the situation. '£he opposition 



HON. ^.LEXANBEB MACKENZIB. 403 

was a powerfal one, and the Cartier-Macdonald government was tottering to 
its fall. Day by day it grew weaker until at length it met defeat on the 
Militia Bill. There was nothing for it but to resign. 

Mr. John Sandfield Macdonald was called upon to form an administration 
and met with the support of the Liberals in both Upper and Lower Canada. 
It was during his administration that Alexander Mackenzie in a speech 
expressed a desire to see a united Canada from the Atlantic to the Rocky 
Mountains. He was not yet far-sighted enough to see that there 
could be a united Canada from the Atlantic to the far Pacific. 
In 1860 Mr. R. W. Scott introduced a' Bill for the establishment ot 
Separate Schools. Mr. Mackenzie opposed this Bill, as he believed that they 
would be an injury to the Public School system of the Province. There was 
no bigotry in his opposition. He had no desire, whatever, to make the 
question a religious one, but, as the schools of Upper Canada were non- 
denominational, he deemed Separate Schools unnecessary. 

At the next general election Mr. Mackenzie once more stood for Lambton. 
His opponents saw how hopeless their cause was and withdrew all opposition 
and he was elected by acclamation. On his return to parliament he once 
more entered with energy into the debates of the House and was recognized 
as one of the strongest of Canada's public men. He was, indeed, much 
clearer-visioned than such reformers as Mr. Brown and Mr. Mowat, and when 
the celebrated Coalition Government was formed he strongly opposed the 
Liberals joining forces with the Tories led by Sir John A. Macdonald. He 
warned Mr. Brown and his friends that they would be used by the astute 
leader of the Tory party to advance his own interests and then they would be 
cast aside as lightly as a soiled glove. He prophesied that the formation of 
the Coalition government would do permanent injury to the interests of his 
party. And events have shown how well he forecast the future. At the same 
time he expressed himself as anxious to see the difficulties before the country 
settled on a permanent basis, and promised his support to any wise and just 
legislation that the new government might advance. 

One of the most interesting periods of Canadian parliamentary history 
was that of the Confederation debates, which began in 1864. Mr. Mackenzie 



404 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

had given much time and thought to the question, and had studied with care 
the federal system of the United States. Although deploring the coalition he 
could not remain silent at such a time. He was a warm advocate of federal 
union. The Maritime Provinces linked to the Upper Provinces by a girdle 
of railway would tend to make a strong and united country. He saw, too, 
the possibilities of the great West and spoke in glowing words, that thrilled 
his hearers, of the future of that vast country. In the following year he 
again took part in the debates and was listened to with pleasure by men 
accustomed to the finished oratory of such speakers as George Brown. When 
Brown vacated his seat in the government in 1865, the Liberals, looking upon 
Mr. Mackenzie as the strongest man in their party, offered it to him but 
before giving his answer he consulted with Mr. Brown and decided to decline 
the portfolio. It would be hard, indeed, to imagine Mr. Alexander Mackenzie 
in the same cabinet with Sir John A. Macdonald. At this time there was a 
tendency to introduce into Canada the protection system, but Mr. Mackenzie 
was a disciple of Cobden and Bright, and strenuously opposed Mr. Gait's 
financial policy, having no faith that protection would establish in the 
country industries that would be a permanent benefit. 

In 1867 there was to be a remarkable fulfillment of the prophesies he 
made when he warned Mr. Brown against the coalition of '64. Mr 
Howland and Mr. MacDougall accepted positions in the new government led 
by Sir John A. Macdonald. By so doing they split the Liberal party in 
twain and greatly strengthened the hands of the Tories. He spoke with 
such vigor at this time and with such knowledge of the questions before the 
country, that it began to be generally recognized that the stone-mason of 
Sarnia was the one man capable of leading the Liberal party, now left 
practically leaderless by the retirement of Mr. Brown from active political 
life. 

The election of 1867 was naturally an exciting one. Mr. Mackenzie 
was in opposition to the government, and every efibrt was put forth to defeat 
him, but his ability and integrity made him the idol of the Liberals of 




THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON 



HON. ALEIAKDER MACKENZIIB. 407 

Lambton, and, despite the presence of Mr. MacDougall in his constituency, or 
possibly on account of it, he was returned by a majority of nearly seven 
hundred. 

He was now practically the leader of the Liberal forces in parliament and 
expressed himself on every important question that came up. Under the 
leadership of Mr. Joseph Howe Nova Scotia had become an opponent of 
Confederation, and in the speeches on this matter Mr. Mackenzie's were the 
most likely to win the Province by the sea to the federal union. He likewise 
strongly favored the acquisition of the North West Territories as a field for 
the energies of the young men of Eastern Canada, who were flocking to the 
United States. He was opposed to militarism and vigorously objected to the 
expenditure of money on inland fortifications. Our relations with the 
United States were such and should continue to be such that no forts or guns 
would be needed save those required to give our sons a military training to 
fit them for war if the Empire should ever require their services. 

During the first session after Confederation was consummated, the matter 
of Sabbath observance came up in the House. Alexander Mackenzie, as was 
to be expected from his temperament and training, tooR a decided stand in 
favor of Sabbath observance and objected to the canals being operated on the 
Holy Day. 

His position as leader of the opposition did much to make him a finished 
speaker, and few better addresses have ever been delivered in the House of 
Commons than his words in seconding the motion of adjournment when Mr. 
Thomas D'Arcy McGee was assassinated : 

" I find it," he said, " almost impossible to proceed. But last night we 
were all charmed with the eloquence of our departed friend who is now 
numbered with the honored dead, and none of us dreamed when we separated 
last that we should so very soon be called in this way to record our afiection 
for him. It was my own lot for many years to work in political harmony 
with him, and it was my lot sometimes to oppose him. But through all the 
vicissitudes of political warfare we ever found him possess that generous 
disposition characteristic of the man and his country, and it will be long, as 
the leader of the government has said, before we can see his like amongst us. 



408 ' BUILDERS OP CANADA. 

I think there can be no doubt he has fallen a victim to the noble and 
patriotic course which he has pursued in this country with regard to the 
relations between his native land and the Empire, and I can only hope that the 
efforts to be made by the government will lead to the discovery that to an 
alien hand is due the sorrow that now clouds not only this House, but the 
whole community." 

When the rebellion broke out in the North West in 1870 Mr. Mackenzie 
was one of the strongest advocates of a vigorous policy. Where bloodshed 
was likely to occur, and where the flames of insurrection might spread, rapid 
and strong action, he believed, to be the duty of the government. He was 
prepared to support Sir John Macdonald in putting down the rebellion and 
advised the sending of an adequately strong force to grapple with the 
situation, but when the rebellion was suppressed it was he who moved to 
grant a full amnesty to all prisoners except Riel, Lepine and O'Donohue. 
He was essentially a man of peace but realized that sometimes a vigorous war 
policy is the best way of securing peace. 

While he would have peace within the country he was at the same time 
desirous of having Canada live in the most friendly relationship with the 
United States. He recognized that the legacy of hatred from the past 
existing between the two countries tended to keep them apart, and for his own 
country he hoped to see the spirit of retaliation die out ; and had politicians 
on both sides of the line been animated by his spirit a large measure of 
reciprocal trade might now be cementing the two peoples of one blood, one 
feeling, into a common brotherhood. 

Mr. Mackenzie stood for Middlesex for the local Legislature and was 
elected by a large majority. The government had lost the confidence of the 
country and Mr. Blake was asked to form a government. He did so and 
selected Mr. Mackenzie as his Provincial Treasurer. It was neccessary that 
he should go to his constituents for re-election, but all opposition was 
withdrawn and he returned to the Assembly. He proved himself a most able 
financier. In his budget speech he pointed out the need of building the 
future Province on a sound basis of education. He, likewise, advanced the 
need of a wise immigration policy. He was not, however, to have a long 



HON. ALEXANDER MJfCKENZIB. 409 

experience in the Local House. He and Mr. Blake found, that before they 
could hold seats in the Dominion parliament, they would have to resign from 
the Local Legislature, and so in 1872, handing over the reins of government 
to the wise hands of Oliver Mowat, who was to remain in power for so many 
years, they returned to the arena of the Dominion. 

The fight of 1872 was a notable one ; the Conservative party was open to 
attack from many points of view. The North West question had been 
handled badly and the dissatisfaction that culminated in insurrection, was, in 
the opinion of Mr. Mackenzie, due to their crass negligence. He waged a 
vigorous campaign on this and other important questions, and when Sir John A. 
Macdonald was returned to power it was with a greatly reduced majority. The 
Liberals were now hopeful. They had a man of integrity and strength to 
lead their forces and they expected that at the next general election they 
would win. Their turn was to come much sooner than they had expected. The 
provinces of the east and west had been drawn into Confederation largely by 
the promise of a vast railway that would make the country a physical unit 
from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and they now looked to the government for 
the fulfillment of the promise made when Confederation was consummated. 
From the beginning Mr. Mackenzie was antagonistic to hurrying the work of 
construction. He believed that the great railway across the plains and over 
the Rockies should be built slowly, and as the resources of the country 
demanded it. On this question time has proved that he was far from being 
a great statesman. He had serious limitations, and in nothing are these 
better shown than in his attitude towards the Canadian Pacific Railway. 
For the rapid building up of a great nation the statesman at its head needs 
something of the business spirit of a Cecil Rhodes, and this spirit animated 
the breast of Sir John A Macdonald ; and therein lies the great difference 
between him and Alexander Mackenzie. 

Out of the great railway question was to come victory for the Liberal 
party. In several of the sketches in this book this matter has been dealt 
with, and it is unnecessary to say much with regard to it here. Scarcely had 
Sir John A. Macdonald been returned to power when around him gathered 
the storm clouds. It was discovered that Sir Hugh Allan, who was 



410 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

interested in a company formed to construct the Canadian Pacific Railway had 
contributed largely to the Conservative election funds. The charges of Mr. 
Huntington brought the matter before the country. The friends of Sir John 
Macdonald have endeavored to show that there was no political corruption in 
his dealings with Sir Hugh Allan ; his enemies, on the other hand, have 
been decided in their eflPorts to make him out the blackest of the black. Mr. 
Mackenzie, who had a very high sense of political morality, believed him 
guilty, and led the forces battling against him. The whole country was 
aroused. The evidence was such that there was nothing left for Macdonald 
to do but to resign. Mr. Mackenzie, as leader of the opposition, was 
thereupon requested to form ft new administration, and he did so, selecting 
the following cabinet : 

Premier and Minister of Public Works Hon. Alexander Mackende 

Minister of Justice Hon. A. A. Dorion 

Minister of Finance Hon. R. J. Cartwright 

Minister of Militia and Defence Hon. William Ross 

Minister of Customs Hon. Isaac Burpee 

Minister of Agriculture Hon. L,. Letellier de St. Just 

Postmaster-General Hon. D. A. Macdonald 

Minister of Marine and Fisheries Hon. A. J. Smith 

Minister of Inland Revenue Hon. Telesphore Fournier 

President of the Council Hon. L. S. Huntington 

Receiver-General Hon. Thomas Coffin 

Secretary of State Hon. David Christie 

Without office Hon. Edward Blake 

Hon. R. W. Scott 

In the selection of this Cabinet he aimed at dealing fairly with every 
Province, and with all religious denominations. 

Shortly after he was elected Premier Mr. George Brown wrote with 
regard to him, saying " Mr. Mackenzie's hands had never been defiled, and 
that the first Reform Premier of this Dominion was the noblest workingman 
in the land." While writing these words he must have felt keenly his own 
position in the country. He had been ambitious to be Premier, but through 
his strong prejudices and his past record he was an impossibility for such an 
oflfice. 

It was now necessary that the Liberal party should go before the 
country, and Parliament was dissolved on Jan. 2, 1874. The "Pacific 



HOH. iXBIANDER MACKENZIE. 411 

Scandal " was still uppermost in the minds of the public and a great victory 
was won by Alexander Mackenzie. It seemed then that the Liberal party, 
winning on the cry of political morality, and with a man of great integrity 
and force at their head, might have a long lease of power. 

Alexander Mackenzie at once began to put in practice the reforms he 
had promised before his election. One of the first was vote by ballot, and in 
this he was vigorously opposed by Sir John A. Macdonald. He, likewise, 
advised delay in the construction of the C. P. R., deeming it wise in the 
meantime to utilize the great waterways of the west and to gradually build 
the railway as the country needed it. This very naturally aroused great 
indignation in British Columbia, where the people had expected that the 
road would be commenced in two years from the date of their union with the 
Dominion and completed in ten. Through the attitude of the Liberal 
Premier and his followers they saw the great railway that they hoped would 
build up their Province vanishing into the dim future. So warm was the 
feeling in the Pacific Province that the Governor-General, Lord Duff'erin, 
journeyed across the continent to meet the people of British Columbia, and to 
try to allay the bitter feeling. His eflPorts met with a measure of success. 

During the time that Alexander Mackenzie was Premier of Canada a 
number of very important measures passed both houses. A law instituting 
voting by ballot has already been noted, and along with this, simultaneous 
elections, abolition of property qualifications for members of the Commons, 
and enactments against "corrupt practices" at elections were established. 

Another measure of great importance to the country was the 
establishment of the Royal Military College at Kingston. Mr. Mackenzie had 
had some little military experience and saw the need of trained officers. He 
was opposed to militarism and had none of the jingo spirit which often 
accompanies it, and while expending but little money on forts and guns, he 
believed that there should be a nucleus of well-instructed ofiicers about whom 
the militia could assemble in time of need. That his policy was a good one 
these latter years have proved. Nothing in Canada has done more to bind 
the great Dominion to the Motherland than the Royal Military College 
established by Alexander Mackenzie. The work done by the oflacers trained 



412 BUILDEES OF CANADA. 

there in every part of the Empire, and particularly in South Africa, has 
proved what a help Canada can be to the Motherland in time of a foreign 
war. 

Efforts were put forth to bring about a reciprocity treaty with the United 
States but these met with failure. However, the celebrated Halifax Commission 
did good work, and when finally the Washington Treaty was concluded, the 
United States paid $5,500,000 to Canada for fishing privileges for twelve 
years. Before Mr. Mackenzie was elected Premier he had deplored the heavy 
taxation suffered by the people of the Dominion, but now for the management 
of the country's affairs it was found necessary to raise the tariff from fifteen 
to seventeen and a half per cent. Sir Charles Tupper, ever ready to take an 
advantage of an opponent, accused the Liberals of inconsistency. Mr. 
Mackenzie met the accusation by stating that there was no protection in the 
new tariff and that the increase had been made for revenue purposes only. 

The temperance question was, in the seventies, quite as important an 
issue as it is in the present year (1902). The temperance forces were 
advocating a prohibitory law. The Premier had been practically a life-long 
prohibitionist, but was a wise one and uttered warning words which the 
temperance people might well have taken to heart. Had they done so there 
would not have been the lukewarmness that at present exists with regard to 
the referendum. " It was useless," he said, " to give legislation on this or 

any other question until the public was ready for it." " He 

believed they would run great danger of increasing the opportunities for the 
illegal sale of intoxicating liquors instead of having it controlled by some sort 
of licence system as at present. Any backward step in this movement would 
be a fatal calamity to the temperance cause and to the country in general." 
He, however, had much to do with giving the country the Canada Temperance 
(Scott) Act. The country was not prepared for it, and, as he had prophesied, 
it was a failure. 

After the session of 1875 Mr. Mackenzie felt the need of a rest. He had 
now been in Canada for thirty-three years and during that time had, 
practically, taken no holiday. His heart, while attached to his adopted 
country, had lost none of its love for the hills and glens of his native land, and 



HON. ALEX ANDES MACKENZIE. 413 

80 he decided to visit Scotland and renew his youth in the haunte of his 
boyhood days. He was enthusiastically welcomed by his fellow-countrymen, 
and was received by Her Majesty the Queen, at Windsor. How thoroughly 
he was attached to Scotland is shown in the address he made when the 
freedom of Dundee was conferred upon him. 

"I shall continue," he said, '' to reside for the remaining days of my life 
in Canada. • I cannot, if I would, and would not if I could, throw ofif all 
allegiance to my own proud nationality of Scotland. And, sir, it is not 
necessary that anyone should do so. The children of Israel, when they were 
taken captive by the great Eastern monarch, were asked by their Babylonian 
captors to sing them a song of Zion. They replied : * How can we sing the 
songs of Zion in a strange land? May my right hand forget its cunning if 
I forget thee, 0, Jerusalem.' We can, as Scotchmen, sing our national 
songs— songs of freedom or affection, whether placed in Canada or AustraHa; 
whether in the Arctic or Antarctic zones, and feel our national anthem to be 
as dear to us in one place as in another ; for the broad banner of British 
liberty floats alike over every country of the British Empire." 

But the welcome he appreciated most was that given him by his native 
village, Logierait. After his "involuntary triumphant progress through his 
early haunts in Scotland," to quote the London Times, and several months 
of active work in London on behalf of Canada, he returned to take up his 
parliamentary duties with renewed energy. 

When he returned to Canada he found that his opponents were prepared 
to make a vigorous fight to bring his government into ill-repute. The 
country was in a much depressed condition. There was a general depression in 
trade throughout the world, and Alexander Mackenzie was unfortunate enough 
to be in office when the wave of hard times reached Canada. Sir John A. 
Macdonald and Sir Charles Tupper, both great opportunists, knew how to 
make the best use of the circumstances and attributed the depression to the 
Liberal policy. Free trade was, according to them, the cause of the hard 
times in Canada, and Sir Charles Tupper, in replying to the budget speech 
of 76 advanced the National Policy of pi-otection. He accused Mr. 
Mackenzie ot being a protectionist himself in one part of the country and a 



414 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

free-trader in another. Mr. Mackenzie, however, stood by his gnns and 
declared that he would inaugurate absolute free trade at once if the 
circumstances of the country and the position of the manufacturers would 
admit of ii He was an out and out English free-trader and looked upon 
protection as an evil. But the Conservatives saw they had a good thing to 
win votes in the National Policy and hamniered away at it, appealing to 
workmen and to manufacturers, and prophesying that under such a system 
the sounds of labor would be heard in every part of the land, and that high 
chimneys would be erected in every city, town and village. They 
propagated the idea throughout the length and breadth of the Dominion, and 
rapidly educated the people into believing that protection was the panacea 
for the existing depression. Sir John Macdonald in the House and before 
the country impressed its need, and when the time for the election of 1878 
came round, he felt confident of being returned by a large majority. The 
depression continued and the crops failed, and for both the Mackenzie 
government was held responsible. If Sir John was confident of winning, 
Alexander Mackenzie was equally confident of being retained in office, and 
on one occasion innocently remarked : " I find the Tories everywhere confident ; 
why, I cannot understand. My meetings are everywhere successful — could 
hardly be more so." He was soon to learn that successful and enthusiastic 
meetings are not always a sure mark of the confidence of the people. His 
honesty and high sense of political morality caused him to be everywhere 
received with, at least, marked respect, even by his opponents, but when the 
day for voting came he was defeated by an overwhelming majority, — 146 
Conservatives being returned and only 60 Liberals ; and the Liberal party 
was, for nearly twenty years, consigned to the Opposition benches. 

Alexander Mackenzie felt his defeat keenly, but nobly determined to 
remain in Parliament and watch his country's interests. How highly he was 
esteemed is shown by a letter from Lord Dufferin on the occasion of his 
defeat. " Neither in England nor in Canada has any public servant of the 
Crown administered the affairs of the nation with stricter integrity, a purer 
patriotism, with a more indefatigable industry, or nobler aspiration than 



HON. ALEXANDEB MACKENZIE. 



417 



yourself." When Lord Dufferin said this he admirably sunimed up 
Alexander Mackenzie's work as Premier. A great statesman Mackenzie wa8 
not, but a spotless one he ever was. 

He had made a hard fight for re-election and was worn out by the 
struggle ; in his own words he was " as thin as a slate." He was in one way 
glad to be freed from responsibility. His position as Premier had given him 
an insight into political corruption that disgusted him, and to some extent 
gave him a distaste for public life. Had it not been that his duty towards 
his country demanded his presence in parliament he would in all probability 
have become a private citizen of Canada. 

For several years he remained in the leadership of the Liberal party, and 
was the most shrewd critic in the House of the National Policy. In 1880 he 
retired from the leadership and Mr. Edward Blake succeeded him. 

It was in the year that he retired from the leadership of his party that 
the death of his friend and colleague, Mr. George Brown, occurred. He took 
it much to heart, and on the floor of the House, when seconding the motion 
for adjournment out of respect to the memory of the first great leader of the 
Liberal party, completely broke down. 

Like Mr. Brown he had been offered a title while he was Premier. The 
offer was repeated in 1881 by the Marquis of Lome but Mr. Mackenzie very 
wisely declined these offers, believing that titles had no place in such a 
democratic country as Canada, and that they could do nothing to draw the 
colony closer to the motherland. 

He continued for some years to be an energetic opponent of bills advanced 
by Sir John Macdonald's government, particularly criticizing the railway 
policy and the Gerrymander Bill. But his health was far from being good 
and on several occasions he visited the Old World to refresh himself by travel 
and a sojourn in the scenes of his boyhood days. He was everywhere 
received with respect, and his speeches did much to give a true knowledge of 
Canada to the inhabitants of Great Britain. But neither travel to the Old 
AVorld nor to the Canadian West could restore him to his old health. His 
mind was as clear as of old, but his physical being was rapidly breaking up, 
and his voice was heard but seldom in the House. Mr. Blake got out of 



418 i:iiiM>ioi;s oi' ("Anai>A. 

touch with the policy of many of the Liberals and left the party, going- lo 
England to become a prominent figure in the British House of Commons. 
Mr. Mackenzie's health would not permit him to return to the leadership and 
Mr. Wilfrid Laurier, who hac\ \)wu for 8om« years one of the most striking 
figures in Canada, on the retirement of Mr. Blake '>5icame the Liberal leader. 
From that moment new life was instilled into the party. 

Mr. Mackenzie continued to be hopeful for his country and remained to 
the end of his life a staunch free trader. He was not, however, to see tlu! 
return of his party to power, for in 1892 he passed quietly away, on a beautiful 
Sunday morning in April, with the words " Oh I take me home." 

When the news of his death was flashed through Canada all classes 
mourned with a genuine mourning; Ho had ever been a man without spot 
or blemish, and no one could point the finger at any base act done by him or 
recall a bitter or unkind word uttered save when some evil had to bo 
denounced. 

The House was sitting at the time of his death and it ceased its business 
until aft(u- his funeral. Sir John Thompson and Sir Wilfrid Laurier paid 
eloquent tributes to his memory. 

The London 7%/t,^8 adiniiably snina up his character in the following 
words : " Modest by disposition, he, nevertheless, enjoyed controversy, and 
was quite at home in the heat of debate either in the House or on the hustings. 
Better still — the untiring energy, the business-like accuracy, the keen perception 
and reliable judgment, and above all the inflexible integrity which marked 
his private life, ho carried without abai(>ment of one jot in his public career. 
His name has been regarded as a symbol of honesty among friends and foes 
alike." 

Alexander Mackenzie was and ever will remain tlu> Sir Oalahad oj 
Canadian politics, and while it seems almost impossible for a, party to keep in 
power in this country without resorting to methods, that are, to say the least, 
shady, the ideals that he lived up to during his entire public career still live 
under the surface, and must be returned to before Canada's true destiny will 
be achieved. 



("llAI'TKi: XXVI. 

* sill .1. .1. (!. AKIUVI'T. 

ThcskrtcUof theoureprof Sir John jDsrph Culilvrell Alibott, K.O.M.O., Q.C., D.C.T,., wHrll 
follows, Is liiigrly Iroiii the prii of Mis:* Muud Dnilvy, of Moiitrciil, mi<l wiis piiblUlied hi iiuu-h 
more cxtcmloil form lii " Men of To-iUy,"— « •oiics of bldtjiaphics nllte.l uud Itisucil l>y Mi. l.oiils 
H. Tacheof Montreal 1« 1891. 

Kii Jolin Ahlmtt's Parentage— ^Suters a Mercantile House In Montreal— \StiiilirH at MiCitl 
Collojj;e -Orailimtes a H, C. L.— CulU-d to the Har of T/OwtT Cniiada -An Aspinmt for 
Political Honors — A Ivccturer and Professor in MoC^iU University— A Member of the 
I,e};islatnre— Solioitor-Ofiieral — His Atlitnde on CoiilVdfratioii — His Ivej^al KiU)wleil^;f of 
Inestimable Value in the House of Commons — I^xercises an Iniportant Iiilluencein the 
Development of Canadian Railways — Urges upon Sir Hugh Allan the Project of 
Constructing the C. P. R.— The Pacific Railway Scandal— Sent on Important Missions to 
Kngland — His Connection with the Canada Central Railway— One of the Most Active 
Promoters and Workers in the Canadian Pacific Railway Kuterprise— A Director of the C. 
P. R. — Klfcted Mayor of Minitreal— A|)poiiited President of the Corporation of the Royal 
Victoria Hospital — A])])ointed a Commissioner in Negotiating with Australia for Closer 
Trade Relations and Cable Connections — I^eader of the ySenate Accepts the Portfolio of 
President of the Council— iJeconies Prime Minister on the Death of Sir John A. Miu-donald 
—Knighted by the Queen — Goes to Europe in Search of Health— His Death, October 3, 
1893. 

440 Hi JOHN ABBOTT'S faUior, tho liov. Josoi)h Abbott, was bom in 
^3 Westmoreland, in tlie North ol' England, and liia early lifo was Hix^nt 
in l\u) border counties. He took his degree at a Scottiwb IJnivoraity, 
and was soon afterwards sent to Canada as a missionary under the auspices of 
the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel. Joseph Abbott married 
Harriet, the daiiglitor of tbe Rev. Richard Bradford, Rector of the adjoining 
ptirisb, and built a cliurcli and [uiraonage at St. Andrew's, 1*. C^. Here, in 
1821, his oldest son was born and the birthplace of the lateCanaditin i'reniier 
still stands, abnost unaltered, a quaint old-fashioned cottage, with overhanging 
gables and long, low roof, nestling amidst a group of hixiiii;iiiUy I'oliagod obii 
trees, with the winding silver stream of liie beautdui North River vi8il)Io 



• Kroni 'CauAUa : Aii K.iicycloi>ieaiu of the Oouii ry," eillteil by J. cuHtell llopklua. 

419 



420 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

from its windows. , , , At the age of seventeen Mr. J. J. C. Abbott left 
the paternal roof to make his way in the world, and proceeded to Montreal. 
Here he entered a mercantile house ; but, after a few months, the close air 
and confinement of city life began to tell upon the country-bred lad and a 
severe illness was the result. After his recovery he went to Gananoque, 
where he had obtained a position in the general business establishment of the 
Macdonalds, and there he remained until he came to Montreal in 1843, to 
study at McGill College. At this time his family also moved to the 
metropolis, his father having been appointed Bursar of the University, and 
thus he was once more in the home circle. At this period, in spite of Mr. 
Abbott's busy life and arduous studies, he found time to join in social 
amusements, and made a study of vocal music, in which branch he became 
very proficient. His singing was a feature in Christ Church Cathedral choir, the 
principal Anglican place of worship in Montreal, and he continued to direct 
this admirably organized body of vocalists for six years. He graduated as a 
B. C. L., and studied law in the office of Messrs. Meredith and Bethune, and, 
in 1847, was called to the Bar of Lower Canada. His partnership with Mr. 
Justice Badgley and his marriage both took place within the next two years, 
his wife being Miss Mary Bethune, daughter of the Very Rev. J. Bethune, D. 
D., late Dean of Montreal. From earliest youth Mr. Abbott had hoped to 
make his home in his native County of Argenteuil, but this desire becoming 
impracticable, it merged into the ambition of representing it in Parliament. 
Accordingly, in 1857, he stood for the County and was then elected its 
member in the Canadian Assembly. The nominal majority, however, was 
against him, and it was not until after an arduous contest before a Committee 
of the House, lasting three Sessions, that he was enabled to take the seat to 
which he was justly entitled. 

" A short time after Mr. Abbott's election to the Legislature he was 
appointed to a Lectureship in the Faculty of Law in the University of McGill, 
and, soon afterwards. Professor of Commercial Law, and, in course of time. 
Dean of the Faculty of Law. When his heavy professional duties compelled 
him to resign that position, he was appointed one of the Governors of the 
TTniversity, having in the interval, taken his Doctor's degree in Civil Law in 



SIR J. J. C. ABBOTT. 421 

due course. The work of his profession prevented him from taking a large 
part in the ordinary business of the Legislature, and then, as ever, he took 
but a minor interest in the violent disputes and debates on purely party 
questions. But his steady attention to the regular duties of the House was 
conspicuous and having taken an active part in the agitation against certain 
objectionable clauses in the Militia Bill of the day, upon which the 
Government was defeated in 1862, he accepted the position of Solicitor- 
General, under the late M. Sicotte as Attorney-General, in the Coalition 
Government formed in that year by the late Mr. Sandfield Macdonald — 
receiving at the same time his patent of Queen's Counsel. M. Sicotte was 
leader for Lower Canada and the late Thomas D'Arcy McGee was one of his 
colleagues. On the dissolution, in 1863, which followed the defeat of the 
Sandfield Macdonald-Sicotte Government, Mr. Abbott declined to retain the 
office of Solicitor-General in the new combination made with Mr. Dorion by 
Mr. Sandfield Macdonald, and assumed an independent position in the 
general election which followed the dissolution. This new coalition became 
a purely party Government, formed from the Liberal side in politics. As is 
well known, the result of that election was such that the Government of the 
day received but a small majority in the House, and the result was the 
deadlock which was followed by Confederation. 

*' Mr. Abbott was not an enthusiastic supporter of this great measure, 
fearing as he did, the disadvantage at which the English-speaking population 
of Lower Canada would be placed under that system ; and thinking that the 
preponderating influence of the French-speaking inhabitants of Lower Canada 
would reduce the minority to a state of practical impotence ; and also that for 
the British settlers in the Province no career in public life would remain. . . 
Mr. Abbott continued to represent Argenteuil up to 1874. During this time 
he applied himself mainly to the legislative business of the Houss, taking 
little part in the party discussion. While Solicitor-General, he entirely 
remodelled the Lower Canadian Jury system and introduced and carried 
measures providing for the payment of Government fees by stamps, which is 
now universally prevalent with many beneficial results. During the same 

period he introduced the Insolvent Act of 1864, which was not passed at the 
23 



422 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

time of the dissolution of the House. Upon the organization of the new 
Government, Mr. Abbott had the distinguished honor of being asked by the 
Premier for permission to use the Bill which had been introduced while that 
Premier was in Opposition, and he was especially requested to conduct 
it through the House, which he did, though introduced in the name of the 
, Government. This measure gave, in its principles, satisfaction to the country. 
^In 1868, Mr. Abbott obtained the appointment of an important Commission to 
consider its management and the possibility of its improvement, the result of 
which was an elaborate report based upon returns from most of the 
constituencies of the Dominion. On this report was based the Insolvent Act 
of 1869, which retained the principles and the leading features of the Act of 
1864, altering some few of its details. It has been admitted that the Act 
has been the most successful effort yet made towards the establishment of an 
insolvent system in the Dominion. Subsequent amendments were not found 
to improve the operation of the act, but the reverse. They exaggerated many 
of the difficulties, more especially in the matter of official assignees, and 
finally, in 1879, the law was repealed, and the commercial and financial 
community are now calling for the re-introduction of an insolvency system. 

" For many years Mr. Abbott exercised unusual influence in the conduct 
of the work of legislation in the House of Commons. His proficiency in all 
branches of commercial law and in the law of private corporations made his 
assiduous attendance at the great standing committees on railways, canals 
and telegraphs, and on banking and commerce, of inestimable value. And, 
in the latter committee he acted as chairman for a number ot years with the 
high appreciation of its members and of the House of Commons. In the 
intervals of attendance upon Parliament Mr. Abbott continued his practice as 
an advocate in Montreal and was engaged in most of the important cases of 
the day. . . In 1862, Mr. Abbott began his connection with the system of rail- 
ways which culminated in the Canadian Pacific Railway, by his appointment 
to the office of President of the Canada Central Railway. Under his 
auspices a connection was made between the Brockville and Ottawa Railway 
under the name of the Canada Central Railway, and the line was extended as 
far westward as Pembroke. It was his connection with this railway which 



SIR J. J. C. ABBOTT. 423 

first drew Mr. Abbott's attention to the great schem« of a railway across the 
continent. From the beginning he pressed in public speeches and otherwise 
the idea, that the Canada Central was susceptible of infinite extension until it 
reached the Pacific Ocean, and that it might ultimately be the gateway of the 
great Pacific system. His interest in trans-continental communication never 
ceased fi:om that time. In 1871-72, being still interested in some degree in 
the Canada Central, he urged upon Sir Hugh Allan the project of 
constructing the Canadian Pacific Railway, and he was actively engaged with 
Sir Hugh as Provisional Director when a company was formed by that 
gentleman. The object of this was, in the first place, to secure its 
amalgamation with the corresponding company organized in Toronto by the 
Hon. (Sir) D. L. Macpherson, and, afterwards in the formation of the 
company which made the first attempt in England to raise money for the 
construction of the Canadian Pacific Railway. 

" Mr, Abbott was one of the delegation of four — composed of Sir Hugh 
Allan, the Hon. Adams G. Archibald, Major Walker and himself — which 
visited England in 1873, for the purpose of floating the bonds of the railway 
under the charter granted by Sir John Macdonald's Government in that year. 
In June, the delegation succeeded in procuring the signature of the late Baron 
Strousberg to a preliminary agreement for the construction of the line. That 
agreement, the negotiations for which were kept private, was immediately 
cabled to Canada, and the next day Mr. Huntington made a statement in the 
House which was the inception of what is usually referred to as the Pacific 
Railway Scandal. The attack thus made upon the Government and upon the 
enterprise caused Baron Strousberg to abandon immediately the preliminary 
agreement that had been made, and the delegation returned to Canada 
unsuccessful in their mission. Subsequent events are well known to every 
Canadian. After a stormy session, a committee was appointed with power to 
examine witnesses under oath, but the Law Officers of the Crown having 
determined that this power was not legally justified, a Commission was 
instituted to inquire into the allegations of Mr. Huntington. After a long 
investigation the committee reported, Parliament was called together, and, 
after a debate of some weeks, the Government of Sir John Macdonald 



424 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

resigned office in November, 1873. In this affair, Mr. Abbott had some 
prominence as the confidential legal adviser of Sir Hugh Allan, and in that 
capacity he became cognizant of some of the transactions which were complained 
of by Mr. Huntington between Sir Hugh Allan and the Government. He was 
present on the occasion of the request of the late Sir George Cartier to Sir 
Hugh Allan for a subscription to the election fund, and assisted in writing 
the letters which -were exchanged between Sir George and Sir Hugh on the 
occasion. Subsequently, Sir Hugh having left for Newfoundland, Mr. 
Abbott, as his confidential adviser, was applied to by Sir John Macdonald to 
request further subscriptions from Sir Hugh to the fund. This he did, and 
he was the medium of the transmission of that renewed subscription. 

Mr. Abbot was re-elected at the subsequent general election of 1874, but 
was unseated in 1875 on an informality in the voters' list for one of the 
parishes of his county. At the new election which took place in that year, 
he did not offer himself, but the gentleman who opposed him in 1874 was 
again a candidate and succeeded in being returned. Upon a contestation of 
his election, this gentleman was unseated and personally disqualified for acts 
done in the election of 1874 against Mr. Abbott. At the general election of 
1878, Mr. Abbott again presented himself but was not returned. Dr. 
Christie, his opponent, had the recorded majority, but was unseated on 
a contest. In 1879, Mr. Abbott defeated Dr. Christie, but was unseated, and 
at the election which followed, he was again returned by a large majority, 
and sat until the end of Parliament. At the next general election he was 
elected by an increased majority. In 1886, he retired from the House ot 
Commons and declined re-election. 

In 1876, while not a member of the House, Mr. Abbott was consulted in 
connection with legislation, more especially on the subject of the Insolvency 
Law, relating to which he assisted in framing an Act which was introduced 
by the present Chief Justice of Nova Scotia, but which was not ultimately 
passed. Upon the accession of Sir John Macdonald to power in 1878, the 
question of the propriety of the dismissal by Lieutenant-Governor Letellier de 
Saint-Just of his Provincial Ministers came under consideration. After an 
important and instructive debate, a resolution was passed condemning the 



SIR J. J. C. ABBOTT. 427 

action of the Lieutenant-Governor. This was followed by a recommendation 
to the Governor-General that the Lieutenant-Governor be dismissed ; but 
before acting upon this recommendation, it was determined to refer the 
whole question of the constitutionality of the dismissal of M. Letellier to the 
Home Government. For this purpose, Sir Hector Langevin and Mr. Abbott 
were appointed delegates to lay the matter before the Colonial Minister. 
They proceeded to England and remained there during a period of three 
months, while the subject was under discussion. , . . While in England, 
and on this occasion, Sir Hector Langevin and Mr. Abbott conducted several 
matters of importance for the Canadian Government, among which were 
measures relating to the admission and transport of cattle from the United 
States, through Canada, which have been successfully continued to the 
present day. 

Mr. Abbott's connection with the Canada Central Railway, besides 
tending to direct his thoughts towards the great Pacific transcontinental 
scheme, led to his ultimately becoming the purchaser of a share in the whole 
Canada Central enterprise, Mr. Duncan Maclntyre being the principal owner. 
Under the energetic management of the latter gentleman, the construction of 
the Canada Central was pushed forward towards North Bay, and, in the spring 
of 1880, the road being nearly completed, and the scheme of Mr. Mackenzie's 
Government not appearing likely to be in any degree successful, Mr. 
Maclntyre and Mr. Abbott discussed the possibility of forming a company to 
construct the Pacific Railway from North Bay. It was thought feasible that 
it might be brought on from that point to a junction with a portion of the 
railway which the Mackenzie Government had begun near the Pacific coast, 
taking in the link that had also been begun by that Government between 
|Port Arthur and Winnipeg in March, 1880. A suggestion to this effect was 
conveyed to Sir John Macdonald, which was prepared by Mr. Abbott, and 
signed by Mr. Maclntyre. The latter gentleman communicated at the same 
time with Messrs. George Stephen, James J. Hill, of St. Paul, Sir Donald 
Smith, Mr. Kennedy, of New York, and Mr. R. B. Angus, and finally 
obtained their concurrence in the project which had been submitted to the 
Government. An informal intimation was received that the project was 



428 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

looked upon as possible, but that it should be presented to European 
capitalists with the view of obtaining the best possible terms for the 
Government. As is now generally known, Sir John Macdonald and Mr. 
Pope proceeded to England, and negotiations took place with several parties, 
but finally the Canadian Syndicate, strengthened by the addition of Sir John 
Rose of London and Baron Reinach ot Paris, came to an understanding with 
the Government as to the construction of the Canadian Pacific Railway. 

On the return of Sir John Macdonald to Canada in the autumn the 
negotiations were pursued. The syndicate chiefly represented by Mr. 
Stephen, Mr. Maclntyre and Mr. Abbott, with the frequent concurrence of 
the Canadian and American members, entered upon more detailed 
negotiations with the Government. A draft, prepared by Mr. Abbott, of the 
proposed contract was submitted. This formed the basis of subsequent 
negotiations, and in the main formed the contract provisionally agreed upon, 
and, after two months' constant discussion, was signed in October, 1880. A 
special session of Parliament was called in order that the matter should be 
put through in time to start the work vigorously in the spring. The 
necessary legislation was completed, the Company incorporated and the 
contract finally signed on the 17th of February, 1881. Immediately 
afterwards Mr. Stephen, Mr. Maclntyre, Mr. Angus and Mr. Abbott went to 
England to make the necessary financial arrangements for the Company. 
The members of the syndicate were elected the Directors of the Company, and 
Mr. Abbott was appointed standing Counsel. From that time forth until the 
completion of the road he took an active part in all its transactions 
and management, including its financial arrangements and issues, the 
preparation of its legislation, and the organization of its various combinations 
and acquisitions of existing railways. In fact, though not a stockholder, 
being precluded from holding stock by the existing Parliament, he took 
the same active interest in the enterprise as if he had been a member of the 
syndicate. During this period, though, he continued to be a member of 
Parliament, he scrupulously avoided acting in his public capacity in any matter 
affecting the Pacific Railway, never having voted or spoken on any of its 
measures. For some time he was excused from voting on his own statement 



SIS J. J. C. ABBOTT. 429 

of his interest in the Company, which he invariably took occasion to make, 
when a question relating to it came before Parliament. But as he could not 
state that he was directly, pecuniarily interested in the Company, and 
therefore found that he might be forced to vote, he took the course of leaving 
the House whenever a Canadian Pacific measure came before it. Though 
universally recognized as one of the most active promoters and workers 
in the Canadian Pacific Railway enterprise, it was never imputed to Mr. 
Abbott, in the warmest political controversy, that he used his political 
influence in any way to further the undertaking. 

The success of this magnificent Canadian highroad to the Pacific was in 
no small degree furthered by the work of Mr. Abbott in the department of its 
organization in which he laboured, and his name is always associated with 
the promoters of this great national enterprise. Upon the completion of the 
railway across the continent, the disqualification caused by the holding of 
stock in the Company was removed, and Mr. Abbott then acquired stock in 
it and was elected one of its Directors, and retained this position until he 
resigned upon accepting the appointment of Prime Minister of Canada. In 
1887, Mr. Abbott was elected Mayor of Montreal by a majority of about 2,000 
votes over his opponent, Mr. Rainville. In 1888 he was re-elected by 
acclamation, and in the same year was appointed President of the 
Corporation of the Royal Victoria Hospital, an institution which had recently 
been founded and endowed with about $1,000,000 by the munificence of two 
citizens of Montreal, Lord Mount-Stephen and Sir Donald A. Smith, in 
commemoration of Her Majesty's Jubilee. The construction of the stately 
Hospital buildings, costing |500,000 has been proceeded with under Mr. 
Abbott's supervision as President, and they now form one of the most 
striking architectural ornaments of a city already rich in imposing edifices, 
both public and private. The buildings were designed by Saxon Snell, Esq. 
of London, who has a continental reputation for the designing of hospital 
buildings. 

In 1888, Mr. Abbott was appointed a Commissioner to negotiate with 
Australia for closer trade relations and cable communication — for which 
position his knowledge of commercial, legal and diplomatic subjects eminently 



480 BUILDKKS OF CANADA. 

fitted him. He made his preparations for his Australian mission ; but the 
movement for Confederation began and seemed likely to be successful, and it 
was thought best to delay his departure till power in such matters should be 
concentratea by me union oi lue ivustraiasian provinces. After Mr. Abbott's 
retirement fivm the House of Commons he wasoilered oy i::>±r John Maedonald 
a seat in the Senate, with the leadei"sliip of that body and a membei'ship of 
the Privy Council. These marks of contidence he accepted in the winter ot 
1SS7-SS, and, until the 13th of June, 1S91, continued to act as leader of the 
Senate and member of the Privy Council without remuneration or portfolio. 
At the beginning of the session of 1S91, he was invited by Sir John Maedonald 
to accept the portfolio of President of the Council, retaining his position in 
the Senate, and, though his appointment was not actually made he performed 
the duties of that office until the lamented death of Sir John Maedonald in 
June, 1S91. On the 13th of that month Mr. Abbott accepted the trust, 
committed to him by his Excellency the Grovernor-General, as Prime Minister 
of Canada, and he was called, on the Tuesday following, to proceed with the 
business of the country before Parliament, without any break in its continuity 
or any change in its policy. His former colleagues, with great unanimity, 
consented to continue to occupy their former positions in the Cabinet, and 
although the Session of 1S91 was one of the most arduous which Canada has 
yet seen, and presented constant and ever-increasing difficulties to the 
Grovernment, in consequence of the numerous administrative errors and 
oflences which were disclosed in Committees of the House of Commons, the 
Conservative party presented an unbroken tront throughout the Session, and 
the affairs and legislation of the country proceeded without material 
interruption. 

With the aid of Sir John Thompson in the House of Commons Mr. 
Abbott carried the Government through struggles of great parliamentary 
severity, but in the celebrated bye-elections of 1S92 had the satisfaction of 
receiving a marked evidence of popular approval. His health, unfortunately, 
had been poor for years, and only a strong sense of duty to the party could 



BIB J. J. C. ABBOTT. 



431 



have induced him to ever accept or hold the Premiership. On December 5th 
of that year he found retirement imperative and went to Europe in search of 
strength. On October 3, 1893, however, he passed away, leaving a memory 
for great aliliiy, political hcnesty and porsoiiil -(ilf-sacrifice. He had been 
knighted by the Queen m 1892. 



CHAPTER XX7II. 

* THE RIGHT HON. SIR JOHN THOMPSON. 

The brief but notable career of the Right Hon. Sir John Sparrow Dmvid Thompson, P. C, 
K.C.H.G., Q.C., which follows is extracted for the most part from a clever sketch of the late 
Prime Minister of Canada which appeared in 1891, in I,. H. Tache's "Men of To-Day" series. 
It wa« from tke pen of Mr. W. J, Healy. 

Sir John Thompson a Native of Halifax — Of Irish Descent — His Early Education — A Skilful 
Debater — Studies Law — A Reporter in the Nova Scotia House of Assembly — Joins the 
Roman Catholic Church — The Leader of the Halifax Bar — Elected t» the Provincial House 
of Assembly — Attorney-General of the Province — Appointed a Judge of the Supreme 
Court of Nova Scotia — A Diligent Student of Law — Appointed Minister of Justice for the 
Dominion — His Speech on the Execution of Louis Riel — One of Sir John MacdonaJd's 
Strongest Ministers — Knighted for his Services during the Negotiations of the Chamberlain- 
Bayard Fishery Treaty — Goes to England in Connection with the Copyright Question — 
Succeeds Sir Joha Abbott as Premier — His Cabinet — Appointed a British Arbitrator at the 
Paris Tribtmal on the Behring Sea Question — Dies Suddenly at Windsor Castle — His 
Remains Brought to Canada on the Battleship "Blenheim." 

^^'^'^THEN he made his speech in the great Riel debate, Sir John 
y y Thompson was in his forty-second year. He was born in 
Halifax, November 10, 1844. His father, John Sparrow 
Thompson, who had come to Nova Scotia, from Waterford, Ireland, 
his native place, was for a time Queen's Printer, and afterwards 
Superintendent of the Money Order system of the Province. He had 
him educated in the public schools of Halifax and in the Free Church 
Academy. His early training fashioned him well for ways of patient, 
faithful, intellectual endeavour, and we may well suppose that Sir John 
Thompson owes in no small measure to those youthful years, devoted, to 
study under his father's care, the habits of mind which have gone far to 
determine the course of his life. No one who has often heard him speak can 
fail to be impressed by the conviction that he devotes himself with unresting 
energy to the mastering of all the facts having to do with any question with 



* Prom Canada : An encyclopaedia of the Coantiy, edited by J. Castell Hopkioftr 

4S2 



THfi KIGHT HON. SIR JOHN THOMPSON. 433 

which he has to deal, and that he seeks to divest himself wholly of all 
possible prepossessions before making a judgment. He has shown that he 
has courage, though it is not the courage to overcome his convictions ; and 
this courage must have been strengthened in him by his early training. 

Of his skill in debate the young man gave early indications in the 
debating clubs of Halifax, where he gained a reputation as one before whom 
greater triumphs lay when he should seek distinction in wider fields. In 
1859, he was articled as a student-at-law in the office of Mr. Henry Pryor, 
who was afterwards Stipendiary Magistrate in Halifax. He had already 
made himself a skilled stenographer and he now turned his skill to account 
in reporting the debates in the Nova Scotia House of Assembly. In the 
ofiicial reports of the debates of that Legislature for the year 1867, which the 
curious may find for the seeking on the shelves of the Library of Parliament, 
Mr. John George Bourinot, now the learned clerk of the House of Commons, 
who was the Ofiicial Reporter, makes acknowledgment in his preface of the 
assistance of Mr. John S. D. Thompson. In the following year, the preface 
to the official debates had the signature of Mr. Thompson, who had succeeded 
to the place of Reporter-in-Chief During the four following sessions he 
continued to report the debates. These years of service on the fioor of the 
Legislative Chamber of his native Province were of advantage to him in 
giving a thorough and ready knowledge of the procedure of Parliament and 
a complete acquaintance with the politics and political leaders of the time, 
which stood him in excellent stead when he himself became a member of the 
House of Assembly. 

He was called to the Bar in July, 1865, in his twenty-first year. Five 
j^ears later he married Miss Annie Affleck, the daughter of Captain Affleck, 
of Halifax. A year later he became a convert to the Roman Catholic Churcli 
In the practice of his profession he was notably successful from the beginning- 
and before many years held the place of acknowledged leader of the Halifax 
Bar. In December, 1877, after having served as an Alderman and as 
Chairman of the Board of School Commissioners in Halifax during several 
previous years, he was elected at a bye-election to represent Antigonish in the 
Provincial House of Assembly. He brought a great accession of debating 



434 BUILDEKS OF CANADA. 

strength to the Opposition and when the Liberal Government was overthrown 
in the general election of the following year — ^in which he stood again for 
Antigonish and was re-elected by acclamation — the portfolio of Attorney- 
General went to him as a matter of course in the new Government of which 
Mr. Simon H. Holmes was Leader. It was known as the Holmes-Thompson 
Government. On the eve of the next Provincial election he was left at its 
head by the retirement of Mr. Holmes, who had held the portfolio of 
Provincial Secretary, The Government went before the people to stand or 
fall by the judgment to be passed by the Province upon Mr. Thompson's 
Municipal Corporation Act, which incorporated each county in the province 
and provided for local municipal self-government (instead of the old system 
of government by Sessions of the Peace and by the Grand Jury), vesting the 
power of expenditure of the road and bridge moneys in the municipal 
councils, and making extensive reforms in the method of disbursing such 
public grants. Though a measure more to the lasting advantage of the 
province was never passed in the Legislature, it at once raised a storm of 
opposition against Mr. Thompson's Government. A thousand voices were 
lifted against it from a thousand stumps. The Liberals were pledged to make 
havoc of it if they were returned to power. Magistrates, all over the 
Province, whom it deprived of the share they had in governing the counties, 
and an army of people who had been accustomed before the Act was passed 
to obtain or look for appointments carrying with them the expenditure of the 
road and bridge moneys, fought for its appeal with all their might. After a 
hotly contested campaign, the Grovernment was defeated at the polls in July, 
1882, by a majority of five members. Mr. Thompson was himself again 
returned for Antigonish. A Liberal Government came in, and, a month or 
two later, he was, to the great acceptance of the Bar of the Province, 
appointed a judge of the Supreme Court of Nova Scotia. 

When he came out of the House of Assembly he was in his thirty-eighth 
year. He had been a severely honest pohtician ; and though politics, 
perhaps, were not wholly congenial to him, he had won a high reputation in 
his Province. It was chiefly as a jurist that he had stood forth from 
among his colleagues in the Cabinet Then as now, he never engaged in 




THE BRANT MOI-iUr.'IZNT, BSANTFORD 



THE RIGHT HON. SIR JOHN THOMPSON. 437 

debate without making manifest his great knowledge of law and of the 
principles of law. When he was in the Government of Nova Scotia, the 
public affairs of that province were in an unusally critical condition. He 
attempted several reforms, among them the abolition of the Provincial Senate 
or Legislative Council. The work of constructing the railway from New 
Glasgow to the Strait of Canso, which had been abandoned under the previous 
administration, was resumed under new conditions, and the road completed 
before 1882. The railway in the western counties, which had likewise been 
abandoned, was finished from Digby to Yarmouth, a distance of eighty miles, 
and put into operation. The preceding Government had made the beginning 
of a floating public debt, and the incoming administration had to take up a 
burden of more than $300,000. When Mr. Thompson retired from office in 
1882 and made way for the Liberals, the debt had been decreased and the 
regular expenditure so far lowered as to be brought within the limits of the 
income of the Province. 

His father was a friend and associate of Joseph Howe, and thus, though 
his strongest predilections have always been for the study and administration 
of law, there is something to be said on the score of heredity for his having 
become a politician. When he accepted, however, the office of Judge of the 
Supreme Court of Nova Scotia, in the summer of 1882, it was said of him 
that he fulfilled then what had been his chief ambition since he was a young 
man. More than that he restored strength to a tribunal which had been 
losing somewhat of its old prestige. It is said by a friend of Sir John 
Thompson that, when he was made a judge of the Supreme Court, he formed 
a resolution to which he adhered faithfully while he was on the Bench, not 
to allow any day to pass without at least five hours' study of law. These 
three years of quiet continuous thought and study we may well believe were 
more to his desire than the preceding years which had been filled with the 
noise of politics. Among the permanent results of his work, while he was on 
the Bench, is the Judicature Act, which became law in 1884. It was drafted 
by him, and it simplified greatly the practice of the Courts. He also found 
time to deliver a course of lectures on " Evidence " in the Law School at 
Dalhoosia. 



438 BUILDERS OF CA^^ADA. 

When the Dominion Government needed him at Ottawa, he loyally 
allowed his own inclinations to weigh* less with him than the necessities of 
his former political friends. He resigned from the Bench of the Supreme 
Court of Nova Scotia on November 25, 1885, and was immediately 
afterwards appointed Minister of Justice of the Dominion. In a leading 
article in the 3Iail at the time of his appointment, and when all Western 
Canada was curious about the new Minister from the East, appeared the 
following paragraph regarding him : " Starting, like nearly all young men 
of his time, as a follower of Howe in the Anti-Confederation period, more 
from personal fondness, perhaps, than from a profound conviction, he gladly 
acquiesced in the acceptance by Howe, in 1869, of the better terms which, by 
the wise determination of Sir John Macdonald, were made the sign and seal 
of Imperial as well as of Canadian politics. Since 1869 he has been a most 
faithful, high-minded, unselfish and respected advocate of the policy of the 
great chief of the Liberal-Conservative party of Canada. As a lawyer, his 
success has been remarkable. He has the faculty of the initiative, and is 
really learned in the law. As an orator, his style is usually subdued, but 
efiiective, and in due season, on proper provocation, he can exercise a power 
of declamation quite remarkable in one who is not ejffusive in manner. His 
gift of accomplished sarcasm has been the secret terror of a good many 
bumptious gentlemen. Every success he has won, and all the popularity he 
has preserved, and all the authority he has attained are due in part to the 
fact that his high and unstained personal character has obtained for him a 
position which no one has ever attempted with any hope of success to assail. 
He is more successful when he speaks from his place in the House than 
when he makes election addresses in a political campaign." 

After the session of Parliament in 1886, he made a tour in Ontario in 
company with Sir John Macdonald, Hon. Thomas White, then Minister of 
the Interior, and Hon. George E. Foster, at that time Minister of Marine and 
Fisheries. His speech in the debate on the execution of Louis Riel had 
made him vastly popular throughout Ontario ; and though, as a speaker, 



RIGHT HON. Sm JOHN THOMPSON. 489 

he is perhaps too self-contained and deliberate to thoroughly arouse 
such audiences as he addressed during the campaign, the interest and 
enthusiasm increased constantly during the tour. 

At the general elections, on March 5, 1891, He was again returned to 
represent Antigouish in the House of Commons. The election campaign, 
which was destined to be the last of the many through which Sir John 
Macdonald led his forces to face the fortune of political warfare at the polls, 
was contested stubbornly in all parts of the Dominion, and Sir John 
Thompson bore a distinguished share of its hardships and labors. The 
Minister ot Justice owes his knighthood to the services which he rendered 
during the negotiation of the Chamberlain-Bayard Fishery Treaty, in 1887- 
He, in company with Sir Charles Tupper, went to Washington as the legal 
adviser of the British Plenipotentiaries, and prepared for them their briefs. The 
voluminous reports he had previously prepared upon the various questions of 
an International character which had arisen in connection with the Atlantic 
Fisheries had already received high commendation from Her Majesty's 
Government. In recognition of his valuable assistance on this occasion. Her 
Majesty conferred on him the Knight Commandership of St. Michael and 
St. George, in August, 1888. It should be said also that he was appointed 
Queen's Counsel in May, 1879, and that he was called to the Bar of Ontario 
in 1890. It is not needed that mention should be made in this place of the 
many statutes prepared by Sir John Thompson which have become law under 
his supervision to the great benefit of public and private interests. Every 
Session since he has been Minister of Justice, he has brought before 
Parliament a large volume of new legislation. His amendments to the 
banking laws and his constant revision of the criminal law may be specially 
noted as of great public advantage. In connection with the copyright 
question he went to England in 1890, and laid before the Home Government 
the argument on behalf of the Canadian Government in an able memorandum 
addressed to Lord Knutsford, Secretary of State for the Colonies. The 
Copyright Act, to protect the interests of Canadian publishers in respect to 
foreign copyrights, was passed by the Dominion Parliament in the preceding 
year." 



440 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

Following the death of Sir John Macdonald, in June, 1891, came the 
brief Premiership of Sir John Abbott, during which Sir John Thompson led 
the House of Commons and participated in the events connected with the 
striking series of bye-election victories which marked the year 1892. Party 
considerations, based chiefly upon his personal religious views, had made Sir 
John Thompson, in 1891, unselfishly waive his claims to the Premiership, 
which, after those of Sir Charles Tupper, were by far the strongest of any 
public leader of that time. But on November 25, 1892, Sir John Abbott 
found that his health was giving way, and on the faint chance of its 
preservation resigned his post. With general satisfaction, not unshared by 
political opponents, Sir John Thompson was called upon to form a 
Government, which he did on December 6, as tbilowf : 

Premier and Minister of Justice Sir Jolin S. D. Thompson. 

Minister of Trade and Commerce Hon. Mackenzie Bowell. 

Postmaster-General Sir Adolph Caron, K.C.M.G. 

Secretary of State Hon. John Costigan. 

Minister of Finance Hon. George E. Foster. 

Minister of Marine and Fisheries Sir C. H. Tupper, K.C.M.O. 

Minister of Railways and Canals Hon. John G. Haggart. 

Minister of Public Works Hon. J. Alderic Ouimet. 

Minister of Militia and Defence Hon. J. C. Patterson. 

Minister of the Interior Hon. T. Mayne Daly. 

Minister of Agriculture Hon. A. R. Angers. 

Without Portfolio Sir Frank Smith, K.C.M.G. 

Without Portfolio Sir John Carling, K.C.M.O. 

President of the Council Hon. W. B. Ives. 

In the Ministry, but not in the Cabinet. 

Solicitor-General Hon. J. J. Curran, Q.C. 

Comptroller of Customs Hon. N. Clarke Wallace. 

Comptroller of Inland Revenue Hon. J. F. Wood, Q.C. 

Prior to this event, and in the preceding February, Sir John Thompson 
with Mr. Mackenzie Bowell and Mr. G. E. Foster, had represented the 
Government of Canada at an important but resultless conference in trade 
matters at Washington. He had also taken an active part in obtaining the 
refusal of the Imperial Government to the Bond-Blaine arrangement of 1890, 
and was a member of a Conference held at Halifax in November, 1892, to 
discuss the ensuing difficulties between Canada and Newfoundland and the 
possibilities of the latter's entry into Confederation. 



RIGHT HON, SIR JOHN THOMPSON. 441 

Shortly after becoming Premier Sir John Thompson was appointed a 
British Arbitrator at the Paris tribunal for the settlement of the Behring Sea 
question, and for his great judicial services in this capacity was called to the 
Imperial Privy Council. Upon his return from Paris the Premier, in 1893, 
made a political tour of Ontario and was given a most cordial reception. His 
last public function in Canada was the unveiling of the Toronto statue to Sir 
John A. Macdonald on October 13, 1894. A little later, on December 12, 
he died suddenly at Windsor Castle, a few minutes after being sworn in 
by the Queen as a member of the Privy Council. His ceremonial and 
national funeral — from the Royal Castle to a British battleship, and from 
the "Blenheim" to the stately Cathedral at Halifax — was an event of 
memorable import in the evolution of closer Imperial sympathy. 
24 



CHAPTER XXVIII. 

SIR MACKENZIB BOWKLL, 

By J. LambsrT Pavnk. 

Sir Mackenjde Bowell a Native of Knglattd— Of llmiible Parentage — Begins Work at the Age 
of Kleven— An Apprentice in " The Intelligencer " Office, Belleville — At Eighteea Years 
of Ajge Attends Sclu>ol for Six Months —Wins a Teacher's Certificate — Returus to "The 
Ijitelligencer " OSice as Foreman — Marries Miss Harriett Loniss\ Moore — Purchases "The 
lutelligencer" Plant -Kstnblishes "The Diurnal"— In i86S Publishes "The Daily 
Intelligencer "—Fond of Public Controversy — An Honest Politician — One of the Leading 
Citiieusof Relleville— IVcotues a Candidate for Political Honors in iSt>3 — In 1S67 Kloctedto 
theFii-st Douiinioii Vailiaiuont - An Aclivo Moniber of the Conservative Party — In 1S7S Given 
Portfolio of Minister of Customs— In \8i).' Kecomes l.eailer of the Senate — On Death of 
Sir John Thompson t\>illed to the Premiership — His Cabinet — Knighted by Her Majesty — 
A Prominent C^raiigeman — His Interest in Military Atiaus The Character of the Man — 
Resigns the Premiership. 

IT was my privilege to know Sir Mackenzie Bowel 1 for many years, and to 
serve liim in a closely personal capaeity diii'iug the eventful period of 

his Preniiership, as well as for a long time anteiior to that mjime. The 
intiniaey arising from that relationship, and the o[^[>ortnnities it atforded for 
learning his history ami characteristics, make up the only excuse which can 
be ollered for this hiief lut^graphical sketch heii\g pre{nireii by my hands. 

Sir Mackenzie Bowell was born at Rickinghall, in SutVolk, England, on 
the 27th of December, 1823. His father was a builder, and, in 1838, 
emigrated to this couittry. One year later s:\w the hoy apprenticed to Mr. 
George Benjamin, of Belleville, to learn the trade and handicraft of a printer. 
lie was then eleven years of age, and Mr. Konjatnin's printing office, whence 
The Intel! io(-nc(T was issne.1, bail all the iiu'onveniei\ces and primitive 
makeshifts of a country weekly in a practically pioneer settlement. The 
new boy started otVjis "printer's devil," and from confessions of mischievous 
pranks in those early days, it may fairly be assuuted that the appellation in 
his case was not altogether misplaced. His appi"enticeship took him from 
-li2 



MR MACKENZIE BOWKLL. 443 

his home and brought him wholly under the care of his employer — as was 
the custom in those times. Mr. Benjan\in was a gentleman of high education 
and public spirit, and it is certain that ho exercised a great intluenco in 
moulding the character and aspirations of hie young apprentice. It is 
worthy of note that in succeeding yeai^s the young man followed closely in 
the footsteps of his kind and capable mentor ; but in each capacity, whether 
in business, municipal atVairs, social organizations, or in political life ho 
advanced one step higher. This was purely a coincidence, for Sir Mackenzie 
has assured me that he neither set up Mr. Benjamin as his ideal nor sought 
in any way to follow in his footsteps in life. Be that as it may, the young 
" printer's devil " passed through his thre« yeai-s' apprenticeship, and 
at fourteen ranked as a journeynum. It was a proud day for him when he 
realized that lie was a master printer and able to earn an independent 
livelihood. He continued with Mr. Benjamin in this capacity on The 
Intelligei}crr until he was eighteen years of age. He had then saved a little 
money, and, desiring to cq\iip himself with a better etlucation — although 
there are few schools more thorough and practical than a newspaper otVice — 
he went to the school of Mr. Thomas Agar, of Sydney, in the County of 
Hastings, where he spent nx months in hard and earnest work with his 
books. Such progress did he make that at the end of his term he was given 
a certiticate of qualification as t«aoher. More than that, he accepted an 
engagement to tiike charge of a school. 

But he was not destined for work of that sort. It was a turning point 
in his life, and the turn brought him back into closer association than ever 
with his old friend. Mr. George Benjamin. On the Saturday preceding the 
week he was to begin work as a rural dominie he met his tbrmer employer 
and was induced to go back to The Intelligencer office as foreman, at the 
munificent salary oi $10 a month, with board and washing — which was 
probably as much as he would have received, in those days, as a school 
teacher. Six yean later he was given a full partnership in the business, and on 
the strength of this better prospect in life, he consummated an engagement of 
several years with Miss Harriet Louisa Moore, and was married, December, 
1847. Confidence came with experience, and, stimulated by the ambition 



444 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

to rise higher, he joined with his brother-in-law in 1848, and took the 
printing property off Mr. Benjamin's hands. But Mr. Bowell's temperament 
and instincts of self-reliance did not fit him for a harmonious partnership, 
and at the end of three years he became sole proprietor of the newspaper. 
Thus he started in as "devil" and in sixteen years came to be absolute 
owner, editor and publisher. The Intelligencer was still continued as a 
weekly newspaper and a job printing ofiice ; but the young proprietor was 
ambitious to have it meet the growing wants of the community. 
Accordingly, when the first Atlantic cable had been laid, he began the 
publication of a little evening sheet, named the Diurnal, for which his 
subscribers paid him a York-shilling per week. It was designed to give the 
latest European news that flashed through the cable, and it is worthy of 
passing mention that the operator who received those dispatches was Mr. H. P. 
Dwight, the now widely-known General Manager of the Great North-Western 
Telegraph Company. But the Diurnal was not a paying investment, and 
after a time was abandoned. In 1866 the publication of the Daily 
Intelligencer was begun, and, although Sir Mackenzie ceased to have any 
connection with it in 1878, it has ever since continued to flourish. 

Interest quite naturally centres in the genesis of Sir Mackenzie Bowell's 
public career. He was still a very young man when he became identified 
with a local debating club, and was one of its most enthusiastic and possibly 
pugnacious members until a little incident occurred which diverted him 
permanently from the mock to the real arena of discussion. The subject for 
debate on a particular evening was the time-worn and still unsettled question : 
" From which does man derive more pleasure, anticipation or realization ?*' 
and an Irish' schoolmaster of the old stamp was in the chair as judge. The 
young printer came heavily primed for the occasion, and presented what he 
believed to be a convincing argument in favor of " anticipation." The old 
schoolmaster evidently thought the same, yet he summed up in rich 
Hibernian brogue as follows : " B'ys, ye have debated this soobject wid a 
good deal of tact and ability. The side of anticipation has the best of the 
argument, but as Oi belave in realisation, Oi decide that way !" This was 
too much for the youthful orator, and he never returned to the debating 




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8IS MACKENZIE BOWELL. 447 

school. But he did not weaken in his interest in public controversy, and at 
24 years of age, full of the vivacity and fearlessness which has characterized 
his whole life, he plunged into the thick of a political campaign. He went 
through the County of Hastings in the interest of Mr. (afterwards the 
Honourable) Edmund Murney, and, although his candidate was defeated, he 
did not lose heart ; for in 1849, two years later, the struggle was renewed 
with victorious results. It was in this campaign of 1849 that an incident 
occurred which fairly illustrates the character of the man and of the times. 
He was given $10 to defray the expenses of the election in the Township of 
Hungerford, one of the largest divisions in the Riding. It cost him $1 to 
have a voter taken from Tweed to Marmora, a distance of about sixteen 
miles, and with some satisfaction he afterwards returned $9 to the Central 
Committee in Belleville. Those who are familiar with the heavy costs 
attending the election campaigns of to-day, might properly wish for a return 
to the inexpensive methods of those primitive days. 

With unabated enthusiasm Mr. Bowell took an active part in public 
afifairs in general from that time onward. Athough repeatedly urged te 
accept municipal responsibilities, he steadily held to the purpose of keeping 
out of that arena ; but for thirteen years he was a member of the School 
Board of Belleville, during eleven of which he served as Chairman and part 
of the time also as Chairman of the Grammar School Board. Throughout his 
life he has displayed the deepest interest in matters appertaining to education, 
and one of the objects of his long journey up the north-west coast of British 
Columbia and across the prairies of the North- West Territories during the 
summer of 1895 was to personally investigate the system of Industrial Schools 
established by the Government among the Indians. Sir Mackenzie Bowell 
first became a candidate for political honors in 1863. Mr. Benjamin, who 
had represented the riding for fourteen years, declined in that year to run 
again, and his one-time protege was put forward in his stead. At that time 
Upper Canada constituencies were in a state of feverish excitement over racial 
and religious questions. The Globe, under George Brown, had been waging 
for some years a bitter crusade against Roman Catholic institutions in 
general and special privileges in particular. The question immediately at 



448 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

issue was the incorporation of Roman Catholic Institutions, and " The Ladies 
of Loretto " was singled out for special controversy. Mr. Benjamin had voted 
for the latter measure and Mr. Bowell was now called upon to pledge 
himself to an opposite course. He refused. He took the high and patriotic 
ground that, in a country like this, occupied by a heterogeneous population, 
it was impossible to govern successfully along such narrow lines. He argued 
that it would be unjust to take away rights and privileges which had been 
acquired by law, and contrary to what he understood to be the principles of 
the Conservative party. Prejudices were, however, actively aroused, and, as 
is always the case under such circumstances, a deaf ear was turned to the 
voice of reason and toleration. Mr. Bowell was defeated. 

It is an extraordinary coincidence that at the very threshold of his 
political career he should have been confronted by the same phase of religious 
controversy that met him when he assumed the Premiership. Mr. Bowell 
knew that his position upon the issue of 1863 meant certain defeat ; yet he 
refused to do violence to his sense of justice, regardless of the course of 
expediency which his ambition for a seat in Parliament might have 
suggested. In 1867, he was elected to the first Dominion Parliament. In 
the years which had intervened between his first candidature and this contest, 
the bargain of Confederation had been consummated, and its provisions had 
been accepted by the people at large. The electoral riding of North Hastings 
was composed then, as it is to-day, of strongly Protestant elements, and on 
general principles Separate Schools found no favor in the community ; but 
they realized that these concessions formed a part of the basis of Confederation, 
and they accepted them as being outside the pale of useful controversy. 
Thus, Mr. Bowell entered Parliament without compromising the principles 
which he had laid down in his first appeal to the people of Hastings. 

I have neither the space nor the disposition at this time to follow him 
through his twenty-five years in the House of Commons. It would be too long 
a story. Suffice it, that his restless energy took him quickly into the active 
business of the House. His natural fondness for details and fearless methods 
of analysis soon made him a conspicuous figure in the shaping of 
Parliamentary measures. Later on, when his party had passed into 



BIS MACKENZIE BOWELL. 449 

oppositioii, and it was numerically weak in the House, it is said that he 
became a veritable thorn in the side of the Government. Early and late, on 
the floor of the House and in the Committee rooms, in the press and on the 
hustings, he carried on a vigorous and unceasing fight for the principles of 
his party, and when Sir John Macdonald was returned to power in 1878, no 
one was surprised that Mackenzie Bowell should be given the important 
portfolio of Minister of Customs in the new Government. It is worthy of 
mention that ho was, in 1895, the sole survivor in oflSce of the Cabinet of 1878 
— six of his colleagues of 1878 having died and the others being in various 
spheres of Ufa outside. For thirteen years he served as Minister of Customs ; 
for a year aa Minister of Militia ; for two years as Minister of Trad© and 
Commerce ; and for a year and nearly five months — December 21, 1894, to 
April 27, 1896— as Premier and President of the Council. When the late 
Sir John Thompson assumed the Premiership, in December, 1892, Mr. 
Bowell was asked to take the leadership of the Senate, and he assumed it 
with reluctance. This took him out of the House of Commons, where he had 
sat for twenty-five years in unbroken representation of the North Riding of 
Hastings. It was in the year following this change that he made his famous 
visit to Australia, and paved the way for the Colonial Conference of 1894 — 
which gathering may yet come to be regarded as one of the most significant 
events in the modern history of the British Empire. On December 14, 
following the tragic death of Sir John Thompson, he was called to the 
Premiership, and on the 1st of January, 1895, he was knighted by Her 
Majesty. His Ministry was made up as follows : 

Premier and President of the Council Hon. Sir Mackenzie Bowell 

Minister of Justice Hon, C. H. Tupper 

Minister of Trade and Commerce Hon. W. B. Ives 

Postmaster-General Hon. Sir A. P. Caron 

Secretary of State Hon. A. R. Dickey 

Minister of Finance ..., Hon. G. E. Foster 

Minister of Marine and Fisheries Hon. John Costigan 

Minister of Railways and Canals Hon. J. G. Haggart 

Minister of Public Works Hon. J. A. Ouimet 

Minister of Militia Hon. J. C. Patterson 

Minister of the Interior Hon. Thomas M. Daly 

Minister of Agriculture Hon. A. R. Angers 



450 r.rii.DKKS of canapa. 

Without Portfolio Hon. Sir Frank Smith 

Without Portfolio Hon. W. H. Montague 

Without Poitfolio Hon. D. Ferguson 

Not in Cabinet 

Solicitor-General Hon. John J. Curran 

Comptroller of Inland Revenue Hon. John F. Wood 

Comptroller of Customs Hon. N. Clarke Wallac* 

No reference to the career of Sir Mackenzie Bowell would be complete 

without incidental treatment of the part which he has phiyed as a volunteer 

and as an Orangeman. It was in 1857 that he joined with two others in the 

organisation of the Belleville Rifle Company of sixty-five men, taking the 

personal rank of Ensign. At that time all that the Government furnished in 

Class B were the arms, the uniforms being purchased almost wholly by the 

officers. In 1860 his Company was re-uniformed and the officers bore the 

additional expense of providing a band. In 1864 the Belleville Rifle 

Company, with other similar volunteer organizations, was called out for 

service along the Canadian frontier, in order to prevent raids being made 

upon the United States by Southerners who were making this country a base 

of operations. The Belleville Company was stationed at Amherstburg, 

Ontario, for four months, and on returning home in May, 1865, the 

Ensign decided to retire. When the Fenian Raid occurred in 1866 the 

military spirit again took possession of liim. The Captain of No. 1 Company 

of the 15th Battalion could not leave for the front, and Mackenzie Bowell, 

regardless of business and domestic care, volunteered to take his place. He 

was accepted and put in charge of No. 1 Company as Captain. The Battalion 

served at Prescott until the Fenian trouble was over. Subsequently the 

49th Battalion was organized. No. 1 Compan}'- being composed of the old Rifle 

Company organized in 1857, and Mr. Bowell was made Senior Major. He 

continued in that rank for five years and for two years afterwards was brevet 

Lieutenant-Colonel. He then permanently retired retaining the senior rank. 

Sir Mackenzie Bowell's experience as an Orangeman dates from 1842, when, 

at nineteen years of age he was initiated into that Order. It would be a long 

story to trace his rise from the ranks to the high offices, and many facts oi 

interest in that relation must be passed over. Beginning at the humble post 



SIB MACKENZIE BOW ELL. 461 

of Tjler, be passed step by step upward until he became Provincial Grand 
Master. This he held for eight years, and then succeeded the late Hon. 
John Hillyard Cameron, as Most Worshipful Grand Master. While in that 
office he was sent as a delegate to Great Britain, and was there elected as the 
first President of the Triennial Council. In 1878, after having occupied the 
first Chair for eight years, he retired from office in the Orange Order. 

It may not be amiss to hint at the qualities which I believe brought 
Mackenzie Bowell into great public prominence. It was my privilege to 
study his character from a point of advantage for a number of years, and I 
know that I shall have the concurring judgment of all those who know him 
best, when I say that he owes very much to his prodigious energy, his 
masterly grasp of detail, his urbanity of manner and his spotless integrity of 
life. In short, he has been a very capable man, who has commanded 
popular trust. He stands for what the world recognizes as " a good all round 
man," gifted with acute sagacity in many things, and bringing a robust 
common sense to bear on all things. It was Sir Thomas Fowell Buxton who 
said : " The longer I live the more I am certain that the great diflference 
between men, between the great and the insignificant, is energy, invincible 
determination, an honest purpose once fixed, then death or victory. This 
quality will do anything in the world ; and no talents, no circumstances, 
will make a two-legged creature a man without it." A hundred apt 
illustrations of this truthful observation could be drawn from our everyday 
life in commerce, in education, in religion, and in politics ; but it has no 
more conspicuous exponent than Sir Mackenzie Bowell. 

Towards the close of April, 1896, Sir Mackenzie resigned the 
Premiership, and Sir Charles Tupper, Bart., was called upon to form a 
Cabinet. I know that it would afford interesting reading if I were to detail 
the circumstances which came under my personal observation during those 
days of trouble and excitement in December, 1895, and January, 1896, but 
it would not be proper that I should do so now, nor would such a statement 
serve any useful purpose. It is sufficient to say at this time that Sir 
Mackenzie came out of the ordeal without a stain on his good name, and 
passed into quieter avenues of public life with the knowledge that he had the 



452 BUILDEKS OF CANADA. 

sincere sympathy of a vast majority of the people of Canada. No one 
realized more deeply than himself that he lacked some of the qualities which 
make a political leader strong ; but it was not one of his failings to flinch 
from the dictates of duty nor to depart from his strict notions of fair play 
and justice. It can never be denied that he was moved in his general 
conduct by high patriotic considerations ; nor that he yielded his full energy 
to the promotion of measures which he conscientiously believed were for the 
pubHc weal. Speaking of his Ufe as a Cabinet Minister, it may be said that 
he was not an intolerant man swayed by narrow views ; on the contrary it 
may be maintained that he brought a broad-minded judgment to bear on all 
matters coming within the scope of his administration. He was not even a 
strong partisan, as has often been said by those who judged only from 
superficial evidences. He was an uncompromising Conservative so far as 
general policy was concerned; but I never knew him to allow party 
considerations to influence him in his friendships, in his notions of right and 
wrong, or in his conceptions of what was for the best good of the pubhc 
servic*. 



CHAPTER XXIX 

8IB CHARLES TUFPEB. 

By J. Castki-i, Hopkima, 

Sir Chsffes Tapper One of the Great Leadera of the ConservaUye Party of British North 
America — The Right-Hand of Sir John A. Macdonald — Born at Amherst, Nova Scotia — 
The Son of a Clergyman — Educated in Nova Scotia and at the University of Edinburgh — 
Receives the Degree of M. D. in 1843 — Practises Medicine in Nova Scotia — His Marriage — 
Joseph Howe his Great Rival — Defeats Hovre for the Provincial Asse-mbly in 1855 — The 
Fighting Head of the Conservative Party in Nova Scotia — The Conservatives in Power — 
Tupper Appointed Provincial Secretary — Goes to London to Promote the Building of a 
Railway from Halifax to Quebec — Practises Medicine in Halifax — In 1864 Becomes 
Premier of Nova Scotia — His Part in Confederation — Becomes President of the Privy 
Council — Minister of Inland Revenue — Minister of Customs — Takes a Strong Interest in 
the Canadian Pacific Railway — In Opposition — Practises his Profession in Ottawa and 
Toronto — Advocates the National Policy — Minister of Public Works, Etc. — Created a 
K.C.M.G. — Sir Charles Tupper a Vigorous Debater — Becomes High Commissioner for 
Canada in London — In 1887 Appointed Minister of Finance — Returns to London as High 
Commissioner — Does Good Work for Canada as High Commissioner — In 1891 Helps Sir 
John in his Last General Election — Becomes Premier on Resignation of Sir Mackenzie 
Bowell — His Cabinet — His Stand on the Manitoba School Question — Defeated at the 
General Election — His Public Honors — One of Canada's Grand Old Men. 



IN the formative period of the politics and constitution of a new country 
personal force is as necessary as personal finesse. To the Conservative 
party of British America in the latter half of the nineteenth century two 
leaders were given in the persons of Charles Tupper and John A. Macdonald, 
who were respectively possessed of these elements of power in a most unique 
and effective degree. As the years passed on and the Nova Scotia leader 
stretched out his hand to the great statesman of Canada in a policy of federal 
union, and, later on, of railway development and tariff action, a new 
Dominion, broadening out from sea to sea, realized the importance of this 
combination of personal qualities and accepted Sir Charles Tupper as the right 
hand of Sir John Macdonald and his probable successor in political power and 

453 



464 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

party leadership. In that period lie the most important germs of Canadian 
development, and around it may be seen the shadows of Provincial and 
National struggles in which these two men were always to the front and 
always in harmonized public action. Sir John Macdonald combined, in hia 
great public career, a marvellous power of managing men with a skilled 
capacity, which was also innate and instinctive, for knowing what the 
people wanted and how and when they wanted it. He possessed a magnetic 
personality which drew men to him and made the arts of an orator 
unnecessary. Yet these he possessed in some measure, though not in the 
forceful degree which made his Nova Scotia friend and colleague so valuable. 
He was essentially a constructive statesman and as such employed all the 
elements of conciliation with consummate skill. On the other hand, strength 
of purpose and vigour of attack, strength of policy and determined energy in 
its defence, strength of frame and voice and style of thought were the 
characteristics of Sir Charles Tupper. 

Born at Amherst, Nova Scotia, on July 2, 1821, Charles Tupper was the 
son of the Rev. Dr. Tupper, a veteran Baptist minister and scholar of the 
Province. He was educated at Horton Academy, and received the degree of 
M.A. in course, and afterwards the honorary one of D.C.L, from Acadia 
College. He went to the University ot Edinburgh, graduated as M.D. in 
1843, and became a member of the Royal College of Surgeons of the same 
city. Returning to Nova Scotia he practised his profession for a number of 
years at Amherst with eminent success. There he married, in 1846, Miss 
Frances Amelia Morse, and fifty years later celebrated at the capital of the 
Dominion, amid innumerable congratulations and the receipt of many gifts, 
the golden anniversary of a happy marriage. Up to 1855 Dr. Tupper took 
no active part in public matters, though his commanding presence, clever 
conversational powers and personal popularity seemed to mark him out for 
political preferment. Then came the moment — ^the turning point in fortune's 
fickle favour— which comes to most men at some time in their lives, and 
upon the issue of which, in his case, depended a future of high position and 
wide opportunities for good. 




VIEW OF MOUNT LEFROY IN THE ROCKIES 



Sim CHARLES TUPPEK. 457 

Joseph Howe was then the darling of the people of Nova Scoti*. He 
w&s a man of such brilliant abilities, such far-seeing views, such powerful 
oratorical force, that had the arena been a little larger, and his field of 
achievement a little more important, the ranks of the English-speaking world 
would have rung with his name and fame. As it was he must be deemed by- 
history a great man — despite the limitation of his life and his Provincial 
environment. In 1855, with all the prestige of popular and Liberal 
leadership, and his great reputation as an orator and a politician, he came to 
Cumberland County, where he had been previously elected in 1852, as a 
candidate. for the Provincial Assembly in the general election. Dr. Tupper 
was persuaded to oppose him in the Conservative interest, and in doing so 
faced a running tide of public opinion in the opposite direction and the 
necessity of giving up much of an extensive medical practice. With all his 
energy, however, he threw himself into the fight, and the result of the 
strenuous struggle, typical of many an after contest, was a victory for the 
young Conservative over an eloquent veteran of many years' supremacy, and 
in an election during which the Province went overwhelmingly Liberal. He 
entered the new House with sixteen party colleagues out of fifty-two 
members, but with a reputation which Howe was the first to help by the 
statement that he had been beaten by one who would be " the leader of the 
Conservative party." 

From that time Dr. Tupper was the fighting head of the party in the 
Province, although for nine years to come Hon. James W. Johnston 
remained the nominal leader. With his appearance in the house and 
residence at Halifax, which followed, a new and distinct period commenced 
in his career. His platform in and out of the Legislature was conciliation 
for sectarian issues and the building of necessary railways by and through 
the Government and not as a result of individual enterprise. The first won 
for him and his party the Roman Catholic vote ; the second neutralized in a 
political sense the energetic transportation policy of Howe. In February, 
1867, the Conservatives came into ojQ&ce and Dr. Tupper was appointed 
Provincial Secretary. Largely through his activity and initiative many 
important reforms were effected. The existing monopoly in mines and 



458 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

minerals was abolished, the basis of popular representation in the Assembly 
was enlarged, the Jury law was amended and consolidated, subordinate public 
officers were disqualified from sitting in the Legislature, and the initiative of 
money votes by the Government adopted. In 1858, Dr. Tupper went to 
London to promote the building of a railway from Halifax to Quebec, and 
though the mission was not immediately successful he benefited largely by 
his personal intercourse with English statesmen and by discussions which 
arose as to the feasibility of uniting the British American Provinces in a 
federal union. 

As a result of the elections, in the succeeding year his party in the 
Province was beaten, although Dr. Tupper was again chosen for Cumberland. 
He went into the practice of his profession in Halifax, and during the next 
four years also exhibited in public life that personal vigour which has always 
so greatly characterized him. He swept the Province with a storm of censure 
which resulted finally in the Conservatives winning forty out of fifty-five 
seats in the elections of 1863. Those were days of strong language and bitter 
politics, and in this school the young leader received a training which 
afterwards stood him in good stead in a much wider sphere. The local men, 
however, were not to be despised. No greater debater and platform speaker 
has appeared in Dominion history than Howe, and with him were men like 
Adams G. Archibald, Jonathan McCully and William Annand, while with 
Tupper were the experienced Johnston — ^himself a man of eloquence and 
ability — ^and rising men such as W. A. Henry, J. W. Ritchie and James 
McDonald. In 1864 Mr. Johnston retired to the Bench and at the age of 
forty-three Dr. Tupper became Premier of his native Province. During 1863 
and the succeeding three years much was done in Nova Scotia indicative of a 
fact patent to all students of politics in British America — ^that Conservative 
administration does not mean stagnation, or indifierence to the requirement? 
of public progress. 

During his administration, and by his initiative, the School law of 1864 
was passed. Upon this free school legislation is based the whole educational 
system of Nova Scotia, and out of it has come immense benefit to people who 
at that time neglected the subject and seemed absolutely indifferent to the 



SIK CHARLES TUPPER. 459 

existing inefficieiKsy. Between 1861 and 1871, as an immediate result, the 
number of children attending school between the ages of five and fifteen 
increased from 31,000 to 90,000. But although non-partisan in its nature 
and in its passage through the Legislature, the measure was naturally 
unpopular from the inevitable increase of taxation, and it had an ultimately 
serious influence in defeating the Government in 1867. Meanwhile, however, 
a greater question had come into view — the legislative union of the Maritime 
Provinces — and out of this evolved the first practical steps toward British 
American federation. While John A. Macdonald and George Brown were 
coalescing in the Canadas upon a policy of federal union, S. L. Tilley in New 
Brunswick, Charles Tupper in Nova Scotia and W, H. Pope in Prince Edward 
Island were proposing resolutions in their respective Legislatures for a 
Conference at Charlottetown to discuss a union of the three Maritime 
Provinces. Naturally, the opportunity was seized upon by the Canadian 
leaders to suggest the enlargement of the scope and membership of the 
gathering and to ask permission to share in its proceedings. Dr. Tupper and 
Mr. Tilley joined in the acceptance of the proposal and out of the ensuing 
discussions came the Federal Conference at Quebec, the crowning gathering 
in London, and the formation and establishment of the Dominion on July 1, 
1867. 

Seven years before, in 1860, Dr. Tupper in lecturing at St. John, N.B., had 
urged a federal union as the only cure for the political ills of Canada, and had 
claimed that, although the time was not ripe for complete action, yet a 
preliminary step of great importance would be the union of the Maritime 
Provinces. He had now helped in the accomplishment of the legislative part 
of this large policy and in the constructive creation of the new constitution. 
There was still to follow one of the chief political battles of his life — one in 
which he had public opinion against him and all the vehement and cutting 
force of Howe's oratory and the persuasive influence of Howe's personality 
added thereto. 

In the preliminary stage of the struggle he had been successful, and the 
Legislative Assembly and Council of the Province had both approved the 
Confederation measure and thus enabled it to become law by Act of the 



460 BUILDERS OP CANADA. 

Imperial Parliament. But when the Government of which Dr. Tupper had 
been the head appealed to the people of the Province when the elections for 
the new House of Commons took place, the result of Mr. Howe's agitation 
became evident Despite a struggle on the part of the late Premier, which is 
still remembered for its intense earnestness and force, they were beaten at 
every point, and he alone of the Confederate candidates of Nova Scotia was 
returned to the Dominion Parliament, while in the Provincial Legislature 
only two out of the thirty-eight members were elected as supporters of 
Confederation. In this contest the deeps of political bitterness had been 
stirred, and during the ensuing two years they were to be probed to a point 
perilously near rebellion by Howe and his friends. 

The anti-Confederate leader held the Province practically in the hollow 

of his hand, and, with its almost unanimous protest against the union, he 

went to London to move heaven and earth and the Imperial Government in 

the direction of permitted secession. There he was met by Tupper on behalf 

of the Federal Government, and their contest was thus changed from the 

political to the semi-diplomatic arena. In the capital of the Empire the two 

rivals now met in frequent personal consultation, as well as in public conflict, 

and the result was that while Howe did everything that man could do to- 

move the Government and Parliament in the line of his proposals, he failed, 

and, in failing, found himself face to face with an issue which involved civil 

war or rebellion as the result of continued agitation, and the alternative 

urged by Dr. Tupper of adopting conciliation, compromise and submission to 

the inevitable. He returned to Halifax, commenced the difficult process of 

soothing public passions, and awaited the result of a visit to the Provincial 

capital of. Sir John Macdonald, Dr. Tupper, Sir George Cartier and others. 

Within a few months the matter was settled, better financial terms given 

Nova Scotia, other difficulties ameliorated and Joseph Howe a member of the 

Federal Cabinet. Meanwhile, Dr. Tupper had aided Sir John Macdonald in 

the formation of the first Cabinet of the Dominion ; had helped to cut a 

Gordian knot of Provincial rivalry in its construction which threatened at 

one time to wreck the whole arrangement ; had voluntarily declined a place 



SIR CHARLES TUPPER. ^^^ 

in the Cabinet and had persuaded D'Arcy McGee, the eloquent Irish- 
Canadian, to join him in this signal action of political renunciation. 
Otherwise, George Brown might have been the first Prime Minister of the 
Dominion, and the whole course of its political and natural history 
altered. 

In 1870, when Sir Edward Kenny became administrator of Nova Scotia, 
Dr. Tupper entered the Cabinet aa President of the Privy Council, and two 
years afterwards became Minister of Inland Revenue. In February, 1873, he 
was appointed Minister of Customs, and occupied this position until the 
retirement of the Government in November of that year. During the general 
elections in 1874 he was once more returned for Cumberland County — and 
again in 1878 and 1882 — although the party was in a minority in the 
Province and so remained until the great Protectionist landslide of four years 
later. He had taken a strong interest in the proposed Canadian Pacific 
Railway during the Sessions of 1872-3 and in the debates which followed in 
the Liberal Parliament of 1874-8 ; while in the first Macdonald Ministry he had 
initiated and carried the Weights and Measures Act and a law prohibiting 
the importation and sale of liquors in the Northwest Territories. During the 
ensuing five years of Opposition he practised his profession with a large 
degree of success in Ottawa and Toronto, and also joined Sir John Macdonald 
in making the latter place a national centre of political activity. Both 
leaders resided in Toronto, and one result was the formation of the United 
Empire Club— a somewhat noted party and social organization of the time. 
In 1878, the National Policy, or " N. P.," an embodiment of the protective 
principle, swept the country for Sir John Macdonald and the Conservative 
party. Mr. Mackenzie retired from office, and the new Ministry was formed 
on October 17, 1878, with Dr. Tupper as Minister of Public Works and in 
practical charge of the railway policy of the Government. In May, 1879, 
his Department was divided and he became the first Dominion Minister of 
Railways and Canals, and at the same time was created a K. C. M. G. by 
the Queen. In 1867 he had been made a C. B. for swrices in the cr^tion 

of the Confederation. 
25 



462 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

During the years which followed, and up to 1884, his name is associated 
with the inception, construction and Parliamentary and popular defence of 
the Canadian Pacific Railway. They were years of strenuous struggle with a 
strong Opposition, led in the House and the country by Edward Blake, Sir 
Richard Cartwright and Wilfrid Laurier. The two former were then giants 
in debate — the one polished, incisive and a master of language, the other keen 
and cutting as a rapier, sarcastic and brilliant in oratorical style. But with 
Sir John Macdonald in popular, pleasant, witty defence of the general policy 
of the Government, Sir Leonard Tilley in his quiet, melodious, fluent and 
skilled explanation of its fiscal policy, and Sir Charles Tupper in slashing, 
vigorous, and sometimes fiercely vehement, cut and thrust defence of its 
railway policy and party position, the Government was well able to hold its 
own. In 1881 Sir Charles introduced and carried through the House an Act 
approving the contract made in London and granting a charter to the 
Canadian Pacific Railway Company for the construction of the highway to 
the Pacific which had been promised the Province of British Columbia in 
1871, when it entered the Dominion. The debate on the subject was one of 
the most important in the political history of Canada, and the Minister of 
Railways was naturally its central figure. Something had already been done 
under the policy of Government construction pursued by the Mackenzie 
Ministry and its successor, and these portions of the road were now handed 
over to the Company. The battle which followed and, indeed, prevailed for 
several years, was a keen one, and Sir Charles Tupper had his hands full in 
defending what the Opposition described as an extravagant and almost 
impossible enterprise— one which was to be carried through a wilderness and 
over vast mountain ranges where it was urged that the traffic could not meet 
the ordinary expenses of management, to say nothing of construction and 
indebtedness to the Government. Difficulties, however, were overcome, and 
the impossible achieved. The continental r:ailway was completed by 1886, 
and Montreal connected with Vancouver five years before the date required 
by contract, and in the teeth of the pessimistic fears which surrounded an 
enterprise described in its days of ultimate success by the London Tme$ 
as the greatest undertaking ever attempted by a nation of five millionf of 



SIR CHARLES TUPPER. 463 

people. The Company had conquered engineering and financial obstacles ; 
Sir Charles Tupper had overpowered political opposition; the people had 
risen above the fetters of Provincial fear and a certain form of Colonial 
narrowness which still prevailed. 

In 1883, a new phase of public activity came into the life of Sir Charles 
and he passed for a time from the struggles and successes of the smaller stage 
of Canada to the wider sphere offered at the seat of Empire to the 
representative of a great colony. More fortunate than his old-time and 
brilliant rival in Nova Scotia, he had grasped the national idea for Canada 
and had passed from a Provincial to a Dominion career without being 
trammelled by so fatal an error as the previous advocacy of secession, or 
afifected by a late repentance, which in its result of local and personal 
unpopularity, had broken the spirit of Howe as no intensity of political 
conflict or party defeat could have done. But, in becoming the High 
Commissioner of Canada in London, in 1883, Sir Charles Tupper did not at 
once abandon Canadian politics. He remained for a year in charge of his 
Department and took the ground then, as he did afterwards, that the 
representative in London of Canadian interests was not and could not be an 
ambassador. He was in fact, though not in form, a member of the Canadian 
Government residing in London — familiar with its plans, in sympathy with 
its projects, in touch with its policy. As such he was dependent upon his 
party's retention of power, and it was therefore not antagonistic to the nature 
of his duties, but rather in necessary relation to them, that he should remain 
in touch with and re-assume when deemed desirable, big political duties at 
home. 

From 1884, however, to January, 1887, he found the burden of his 
Imperial position sufficient without the addition of any Canadian home work. 
But at the latter date, with a general election imminent, and at the request of Sir 
John Macdonald, he resigned his position, joined the Cabinet again as Minister 
of Finance, and plunged into the congenial fray as a fighting defender of 
Protection and of the railway policy of the Government. Until May, 1888, 
he held his place in the Ministry and then resigned to go again to London. 
During this year he was chiefly responsible before the House and the 



464 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

country for the inauguration of a policy of protection to iron and steel 
industries, and the passage of a Customs Act to that end. In the midst of 
these duties he found time to accept the honour of appointment as one of Her 
Majesty's Plenipotentiaries to Washington in connection with the Fisheries 
dispute, and, with Mr. Chamberlain and Sir L. S. Sackville-West, was 
instrumental in negotiating a Treaty approved by President Cleveland and 
his Administration, but rejected by the United States Senate. He had, 
meanwhile, returned to Ottawa and carried a Bill, ratifying the Treaty, through 
the Canadian Parliament. For his Imperial services in these negotiations 
Sir Charles Tupper was created, in September, 1888, a Baronet of the United 
Kingdom. Two years previously he had been made a G. C. M. G. 

Upon his return to London Sir Charles took up again the threads of a 
work which he had previously been making of much importance to 
Canadian interests. In 1885, he had been the Executive Commissioner for 
Canada at the Antwerp Exhibition, and in 1886 had acted in a similar 
capacity at the first signal illustration of the new Imperial spirit and 
development — ^the Indian and Colonial Exhibition. At the latter he was 
also a Royal British Commissioner, and in both cases had acted with 
characteristic energy and devotion to the end of making Canada better 
known ; an object which was then the chief function of the High 
Commissioner. At about this time, and for several following years, he also 
did a great service to Dominion agricultural interests in preventing the 
suspicion of American cattle (in connection with the popular dread of pleuro- 
pneumonia) from being visited upon Canadian cattle by their inclusion in the 
embargo against importation alive. In 1888, he arranged the placing of a 
loan of £4,000,000 upon the market at three per cent, interest, and, despite 
the fact that this was the first Colonial loan ever issued at that rate, he 
obtained tenders aggregating ^612,000,000. The allotment waa finally made 
at £95.1 per cent. During these years the growing importance of his office 
was recognized, and the value of his work enhanced, by appointment as a 
Royal Commissioner in connection with the Scotch Qrolter Cokmization 
project, and as a Royal Commissioner for organising the Tmpfflrial Institate, 




THE HON. SIR CHARLES TUPPER 



■LE CHARLES TUPPBa. 



467 



and as Canadian representative at the Sub-Marine Cable Conference in 
Paris, at the International Customs Conference in Brussels, and at the 
International Postal Union Conference in Vienna. 

In 1891, Sir Charles Tupper came out again to Canada at the request of 
Sir John Macdonald, took an active part in the general elections of that year 
— the fiercest and perhaps the most important in Canadian history — and held 
Nova Scotia for his party. After the successful termination of the struggle he 
returned again to London and was, of course, strongly criticized in the 
Canadian Parliament for participating in the contest while holding the High 
Coiumissionership. His defence was that the Unrestricted Reciprocity issue 
made the elections turn upon a proposal which would have involved Imperial 
connection and the national future of Canada, and that he was therefore 
bound to do his best for the Crown and the Empire. Naturally, these reasons 
did not commend themselves to the Opposition either then or since. Upon 
Sir John Macdonald's death, which soon followed, Sir Charles was regarded 
as his legitimate and natural successor in the Premiership and Conservative 
leadership ; but he was in Vienna and made no sign, and party exigencies 
brought Sir John Abbott to the front and later Sir John Thompson and Sir 
Mackenzie Bowell. Meanwhile, the High Commissioner went on with his 
work in England, delivered innumerable addresses upon Canadian matters, 
wrote many strong and valuable papers upon Imperial or Dominion affairs, 
took part in the growing advocacy, of closer Imperial unity and the 
proceedings of the Imperial Federation League, negotiated in conjunction with 
Lord Dufferin the Franco-Canadian Commercial Treaty of 1893, and 
attended the International Railway Conference of 1895 as the Canadian 
delegate. He also secured from the Imperial Government an annual subsidy 
of $225,000 for the Canadian Steamship Line from Vancouver to China and 
Japan, and the promise of $375,000 a year for a fast Atlantic line. 

The year 1895 saw him again in Canada with a view to furthering the 
fast Atlantic Steamship project, and it also witnessed his sudden and 
dramatic plunge into the vortex of a somewhat unpleasant political situation. 
Troubles were rife regarding the Manitoba School question, parties were in a 
state of universal disquiet, and the Government of Sir Mackenzie Bowell w?-' 



468 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

the victim of much difference of opinion as to the proper policy to be pursued. 
The decision of the Judicial Committee of the Imperial Privy Council, 
declaring that the Koman Catholic minority had the right to appeal to the 
Governor-Geneial-in-Council in connection with the Provincial abolition of 
their Separate Schools, had made the issue a Dominion one, which the 
Government thought should be settled by remedial legislation in the 
Dominion Parliament. There was disagreement, however, as to the principle 
and as to details, and finally Sir Charles Tupper resigned his High Commission- 
ership and joined the Ministry in January, 1896, as Secretary of State, for the 
purpose of strengthening lis hands and saving the party, if possible, from 
disintegration and defeat. With characteristic energy he took the leadership 
of the House of Commons, and, if determination and vigour could have won, 
he would have saved the situation. But the approaching demise of 
Parliament by efflux of time made legislation impossible under existing 
political conditions, and at the end of the session Sir Mackenzie Bowell 
resigned and Sir Charles Tupper was called upon to take the Premiership 
and form a new Ministry, which he did on May 1, 1896, as follows : 

Premier and Secretary of State Sir Charles Tupper, Bart. 

Minister of Marine and Fisheries Hon. John Costigan. 

Minister of Finance Hon. G. E. Foster. 

Minister of Railways and Canals Hon. J. G. Haggart. 

Minister of Trade and Commerce ». Hon. W. B. Ives. 

Minister of Justice Hon. A. R. Dickey. 

Minister of Agriculture " Hon. W. H. Montague. 

President of the Council Hon. A. R. Angers. 

Minister of Public Works Hon. A. Desjardines. 

Minister of the Interior Hon. H. J. Macdonald. 

Postmaster-General Hon. L,. Taillon. 

Minister of Militia and Defence Hon. D. Tisdale. 

Comptroller of Customs Hon. J. F. Wood. 

Comptroller of Inland Revenues Hon. E. G. Prior. 

Without Portfolio Sir Frank Smith. 

Without Portfolio Hon. D. Ferguson. 

Without Portfolio Hon. J. J. Ross. 

Solicitor-General without a seat in Cabinet Sir C. H. Tupper. 

He had practically assumed responsibility four months earlier for a 
defined policy regarding the Manitoba Schools — a policy originally taken up 
by the party leaders when he was in England — and this he now proceeded to 



SIS OHARI.Ea TUPPSR. 

carry out Legislation was introduced into the House of Commons along the 
line of compelling the restoration of their educational rights to the Catholic 
minority of Manitoba. But with all the large normal majority possessed by 
the Conservatives in the House it could not be carried in view of the 
obstruction resorted to by opponents. General elections foUowied, Sir Charles 
Tupper was beaten at the polls (especially in the Province of Quebec), and 
after a serious dispute with the Governor-General over certain appointments 
to office, he resigned on July 8, 1896, and was succeeded by Sir Wilfrid 
Laurier and the Liberal party. During the elections his platform, as 
announced in an address to the people of Canada, included continued protection 
to Canadian industries, preferential trade with Great Britain, the strengthening 
of the national defences, the promotion of a fast Atlantic Steamship service, the 
admission of Newfoundland to the Confederation and the encouragement of 
judicious immigration. At the meeting of the new Parliament in August he 
was re-elected leader of the Conservative party and has since then fought the 
Government with never-failing energy of voice and agitation, and has 
exhibited a degree of mental and physical vigour which has been the envy 
of his friends and the admiration of his enemies. 

Sir Charles Tupper, during his long career, has had many public 
honours. He has been Premier of his native Province and of the Federated 
Dominion. He has represented his country at the heart of the Empire, and 
both the Dominion and the Empire on important missions abroad. He has 
had many honorary degrees from Home Universities, and has been made an 
LL. D. of Cambridge and Edinburgh in the Old Land. He is an Hon. 
Fellow of the Royal Scottish Geographical Society, and is, or has been, a 
member of the governing bodies of the Imperial Institute, the Royal Colonial 
Institute, the Imperial Federation League and the British Empire League. 
He has been at the head of his profession in Canada, and was for years 
President of the Canadian Medical Association. The Crown has given him 
many of its highest honours and in doing so has endorsed the people's 
approval of a career which, with inevitable imperfections and mistakes, has 
been a great and valuable one. Personally, Sir Charles has always been 
accessible, courteous in manner and kind in disf)osition. His memory is 



47Q BUILDKlxS OF CANADA. 

lemarkable, whether for faces, facts, figures, similies. illustrations or history. 
His industry has been indefatigable, his energy exhaustless, his oaratory 
powerful, his physical endurance marvellous. 

In an old age which shows infinite variety of resource and tenacity of 
purpose his political enemies are fond of describing his two faults as being 
those of a proneness to speak of the past of Canada and his share in its 
history and a lack of that power of conciliating opponents and holding 
fidends which Sir John Macdonald possessed in so wonderful a degree. A 
word may be said here upon these points. In the first place it is a good 
thing in a young, aggressive and democratic community, looking ever to the 
Aiture and forgetful of the experience of its fathers, to have some reminder of 
what has gone before and of the men who have made the country what it is. 
And who is there in Canada that has described this history so efi'ectively, so 
vigorously, and from the standpoint of a living and still fighting leader, so 
accurately, as Sir Charles Tapper ? It is not the least of his services to the 
country that he has in the last few years taught young Canada something of 
the men and events connected with the establishment of the Dominion. As 
to the absence of political conciliation, much has been alleged by political 
opponents, and it has been claimed that a little more of that quality might 
have prevented the opposition to Confederation in Nova Scotia coming to so 
bitter a head and might have helped the party at Ottawa in passing the 
Manitoba Remedial Bill. On the other hand there is the known record of the 
clever manner in which Dr. Tupper broke up the Liberal party in his own 
Province in the early fifties, of his eflfective and conciliatory policy toward 
Howe in 1S6S, of his magnanimity in connection with the formation of the 
first Dominion Cabinet, and of his able diplomacy in the Atlantic Fisheries 
Treaty and other cases. Taken altogether Sir Charles Tupper was, and is, a 
good illustration in energy, mental and physical power, eloquence, experience 
and probity of character of the best elements in Canadian public life during 
its formative stages, its oonstructiye period and its national present 



CHAPTER XXX, 

SIR JOSEPH HICKSON. 
By J. Castell Hopkins. 

Sir Toseoh Hickson a Native of England-Trained on the English Railway Systems-Assistant 
'^^^Genta^Ma^gerl the Manchester. Sheffield and ^^^ -oln shire Railway -^^^^^^^^^^ 
Chief Accountant of the Grand Trunk Railway-Arrives in Canada in 1862-Becomes 
SretatjaTd Treasurer of the Grand Trunk Railway-On the ^esi^--^jJJ^^f,J, 
Brydges made Managing Director-Appointed General-Manager of t^Grand^^^^^^^^ 
Railway in 1874-Greatly Improves the System-In 1890 Knighted for His Good v^o 
SiTdV the 'Grand Trunk'system to Chic.go-St. ^^^'^J-^J ^^;;7^ttTal- 
Services Appreciated by the Company-Takes an Interest in the Civic Life ^^^^iTlooi 
Pr^Ment of the Royal Commission on the Prohibition of the Liquor Traffic-Holds Aloof 
from all Political Parties— Dies in January, 1897. 

SIR JOSEPH HICKSON, late President of the Grand Trunk Railway, waa 
born at Otterburn, Northumberland, England, in the year 1830, and 
received hia education in his native county. He was yet a lad when 
he entered the service of the North Eastern Railway of England, in which he 
gained his first knowledge of railway operations— destined to stand him in 
Buch good stead in after years. After being some time with this Company, 
he left to fill a position of trust on the Maryport and Carlisle Railway, m 
which he served with credit till 1851, when he went to Manchester and 
took service with the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway, in which 
his promotion was very rapid. Ten years afterwards he became assistant t« 
the General Manager of the Road, and while in this position attracted the 
attention of Mr. (afterwards Sir) Edward Watkin, then Commissioner, and 
afterwards Chairman of the Grand Trunk Railway in Canada. Mr. Watkin 
was even at that time one of the railway magnates of the day. Mr. Hickson 
was by him appointed to the important position of chief accountant of the 
Grand Trunk in December, 1861, and accordingly left England for Canada 
in January, 1862, coming to Montreal, where he continued to reside until hie 

473 



474 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

death. His career from that date was one of uninterrupted personal success. 
He soon became secretary and treasurer of the Company, and this position 
he filled until the resignation of Mr. C. J. Brydges as Managing Director of 
the Grand Trunk Railway in 1874, when he succeeded him in the post of 
General Manager of the system. 

In his new position Mr. Hickson found himself restricted by external 
control, but within the limitations of his power he speedily made his policy 
felt. One of his first acts was to sell to the Federal Government the line 
between Point Levis and Riviere du Loup, and with the proceeds of this he 
changed the old gauge to that of the American lines — four feet eight and a 
half inches — and effected the connection between Sarnia and Chicago. This 
was considered a good stroke of policy at the time, because it opened up a 
new field of effort and enterprise to the Company and marked the beginning 
of that policy of affiliation and connection which resulted, before Sir Joseph 
Hickson threw down the reins of office, in an immense system, embracing five 
thousand miles of track in the United States and Canada. As General 
Manager he continued until 1890, when he retired from the arduous position 
after receiving early in that year the honour of knighthood at the hands of Her 
Majesty in recognition of the ability he had displayed in the management of 
a great Canadian railway, and for the valuable services he had rendered to 
this country in the way of developing its industries and resources. 

During the period of Sir Joseph Hickson's management, the Grand Trunk 
Railway made rapid strides, forming connections that were of infinite value, 
not only to the Company itself, but to Canada at large. The most marked 
of these was the establishment of a direct line to Chicago wholly under Grand 
Trunk control. By this master-stroke of policy, the best paying portion of 
freight carried by the Grand Trunk Railway was secured, at the same time 
giving to Canadian steamship companies some of the most valuable freight 
which they carry across the Atlantic This extension to Chicago, on which 
the astute manager had had his eye for years, gave to the Grand Trunk a 
direct interest in the American system of railways. Under his charge, the 
mileage of the Grand Trunk system increased from 1,383 miles to 3,487, 
which fact speaks volumes for the enterprising spirit of its manager. That 



fCB JOSEPH HICKSON. 475 

great engineering undertaking, the St. Clair tunnel, owes much to Sir Joseph 
Hickson. There were many obstacles in the way of this latter undertaking, 
enough to daunt any ordinary man, but Sir Joseph, who had already discerned 
the great advantages which would arise from the rapid transit of the St. Clair 
River, cared but little for obstacles. They were made, he thought, for the 
purpose of being surmounted, and surmount them he did. The tunnel was 
completed in 1890 at a cost of three million dollars. 

When in 1881, Sir Joseph Hickson paid a visit to England, the Company 
presented him with a service of gold and silver plate, to the value of £2,500, 
as a token of the esteem in which his services were held by the shareholders. 
He was a Justice of the Peace for Montreal, and was interested in several 
banking, manufacturing and industrial enterprises, being a Director of some 
of them. He was appointed by the Dominion Government President of the 
Royal Commission on the Prohibition of the Liquor Traffic. Sir Joseph 
Hickson never identified himself with any political party, the good of the 
country at large and his own business being all he cared for. As a prominent 
citizen of Montreal, and one who took an unostentatious part in everything 
that has tended for the advancement of the city and the citizens, his loss waa 
greatly felt when death came in January, 1897. 



CHAPTER XXXL 

HR JOHN C. SCHULTZ. 
By J. Castell Hopkina. 

Sir John Schultz a Native of Ontario — Of Scandinavian Descent — A Clerk In a Country Store — 
Begins the Study of Medicine — Graduates from Queen's University in 1S62 — Settles in Red 
River Settlement — His Life in the West — A Close Student of the Canadian North- West — 
Begins Newspaper Work — Gains the Enmity of the Hudson's Bay Company — Instrumental 
in Bringing about the Purchase of the Territory — Imprisoned by Riel's Orders in 1869 — A 
Thrilling Escape from Prison — Journeys to Canada — Rouses the Canadians against Riel — 
Returns to Winnipeg on the Suppression of the Rebellion — Elected to the Canadian 
Parliament for Lisgar — A Successful Speculator in Land — His Health Undermined — An 
Energetic Member of the Senate — Appointed Lieutenant-Governor of the Province of 
Manitoba — Given the Title of K. C. M. G. by Her Majesty — Dies at Monterey, Mexico, 
April, 1896. 

The Hon. Sir John Christian Schultz, JL 0. M. G., M. D., was born in 
Amherstburg, Essex County, Ontario, in the year 1841. His father was of 
Scandinavian descent ; his mother of Irish extraction. His eariy days gave 
no promise of the powerfal physique and remarkable endurance developed at 
a later period. At school he was, in fact, rather delicate in health. He 
learned easily and was what Whittier describes as a "silent, shy, peace- 
loving " lad, who gave Uttle sign of the self-reliance and extraordinary will 
which after years developed. His early education was received in part at the 
hands of a retired soldier. After a few years spent behind the counter of a 
country store, kept by his half-brother, Henry McKenney, afterwards Sheriff 
of Red River, young Schultz set out to qualify himself for the medical 
profession. In various ways he learned enough to attend Oberlin College in 
Ohio, for a time, and afterwards Queen's University, Kingston, graduating 
from the latter as an M.D. in 1862. With as little delay as possible he 
started for the Red River Settlement and for some years was lost sight of, 
except by the few with whom he corresponded. There he toiled, making out 
of Red River trees the planks with which he and his brother built their first 
476 




THE HON. GKOI^GE E. FOSTZR 



8IB JOHN 0. SCHULTZ. 



479 



house ; trading for fiirs with the Indiana and Half-breeds ; living often on 
pemmican or such fish and game as could be procured ; and visiting his 
patients on snow-shoes— often taking his pay in furs or buffalo-skins- 
Occasionally he took a trip to Montreal to sell his furs and buy supplies. 

Observant and studious, he informed himself of the fauna and flora, the 
soil and climate, the attractions and capacities of the great lone land so soon 
to become known to the world as the Canadian North-West. He perceived 
the value of the region for grain-growing and cattle-grazing, and lost no 
opportunity of sounding its praises in the ears of listeners, then none too 
willing, in Canadian cities. Having purchased the press and types of the 
Nor'- Wester, established by Ross and Buckingham, he also varied his 
occupations by writing items and articles for the little monthly sheet which 
was the precursor of the Winnipeg dailies of to-day. Loyal to what he 
deemed the best interests of the great territory which had so long been used 
for trading purposes by the then all-powerful Hudson's Bay Company, 
Schultz made himself obnoxious to the authorities of that great corporation. 
At their instance he was on one occasion, in 1868, consigned to prison as " a 
dangerous person," only to be released by an excited crowd of the inhabitants 
who bnttered in the jail walls and broke open its door. Out of this and other 
movements came the Canadian policy of acquiring the territory, the scheme 
for its purchase, and the first Riel Rebellion. In all these affairs Dr. Schultz 
took a most prominent part and was the acknowledged leader of the loyal 
element in the Colony — the British Canadian sympathisers. 

On December 7, 1869, Schultz, with some forty-six other Canadians, was 
made prisoner, and the Doctor placed in solitary confinement by Riel's 
orders. For many weary weeks he was kept in a room without a fire, 
sleeping upon the floor with a single buffalo-skin for covering, watched by an 
armed guard and refused the sight of his invalid wife, for whom he 
prescribed from within his prison walls. But one night the guards were 
induced to watch outside instead of inside the prison door, when the doughty 
prisoner, whose only tools were a penknife and a gimblet, made an opening 
through the window fastenings and squeezed his body through, but in the 
attempt to let himself down the wall his strips of buffalo-skin gave way and 



480 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

he fell twenty feet, injuring his thigh. Lamed as he was he had still to scale 
.the wall outside, from whose top he threw himself into a friendly snow-drift. 
'Then with painful steps he walked some miles, and by daybreak reached the 
house of a friendly settler, where he lay concealed, though sought after by 
Kiel's emissaries far and near. After tremendous diflBculty and a 
phenomenal journey of hundreds of miles through snow and ice and 
wilderness, he reached Canada and passed through Windsor, London, 
Toronto, Kingston and Montreal. At all these points and many others his 
reception was most stirring, for the people had learned by then of the 
indignities their countrymen had suffered as prisoners of the insurgents. 
For this intrepid stand in defence of the interests of Canada, Dr. Schultz was 
presented in various towns with addresses, a gold watch, a gold chain, a rifle 
ind other gifts. Indignation meetings were held, and at the one at Toronto, 
on April 6, when Dr. Schultz, Charles Mair, Dr. Lynch and Mr. Setter were 
present — all refugees from Kiel's violence — ^the Government was called upon 
to take action. Dr. Schultz returned to Winnipeg on the suppression of the 
Kebellion, and in the following year was elected as member for Lisgar in the 
Parliament of Canada, continuing to represent that constituency, with a short 
interval, until 1883, when he was appointed a senator of the Dominion. 

Diligence in business had meantime brought him considerable wealth. 
He had been a successful trader, and had acquired land in Winnipeg and 
other parts of the country which rose enormously in value during the 
"boom." He had also been prominent in organizing the North-West 
Trading Co., the South Western Kail way Co., the Great North Western 
Telegraph Co., and other enterprises in the Province. But his unstinted 
labours, carelessness of his health, and above all, the injuries and exposures 
suffered during his imprisonment and escape, had undermined his health, 
and for some years before his death he was an invalid. 

Li the senate, during several years. Dr. Schultz was indefatigable in 
pushing every matter in which his Province was concerned, though he never 
took action in a direction not beneficial to that unity of the Dominion and 
the Empire which he so greatly cherished. He was Chairman of a Senate 
Committee on North-West matters, in which his extensive knowledge of the 



SIR JOHN C. SCHULTZ. 481 

country proved most valuable. It was a cause of general approval when the 
Government on Dominion Day, 1888, appointed Senator Schultz Lieutenant- 
Governor of the Province of Manitoba. The honour was indeed a fitting one. 
He continued in office until 1895, when he was succeeded by the Hon. J. G. 
Patterson. In the birthday honours of 1894 he was given the title of K.C.M.G. 
by Her Majesty the Queen as a fitting recognition of his services to Canada and 
the Empire. He died in April, 1896, at Monterey, Mexico, whither he had 
g0Q« with hifl devoted wife for the benefit of his health. 



CHAPTER XXXIL 

LOED 8TRATHC0NA. 

The Rise of lyord Strathcona and Mount Royal — Born at Forres, Scotland— Educated at Forres' 
— His Uncle, John Stewart, a Great Fur-Trader — Donald Smith begins the Study of Law — 
Accepts a Junior Clerkship in the Hudson's Bay Company — Reaches Canada at the Time 
of the War of 1837 — Sir George Simpson Governor of the Northern Department of the 
Company — Sends Donald Smith to the Labrador Department — The Hard and Comfortless 
Journey — His Life at His New Post — Promotion After Many Years of Hardships — 
The Rebellion of 1870 Tests Mr. Smith's Character — Appointed Commissioner to the 
North- West from the Dominion Government — His Commission — A Dangerous Mission — 
His Report to the Secretary of State — Mr. Smith's Work in Putting Down the Rebellion — 
Appointed Temporary Lieutenant-Governor of the Territory — Elected to the Legislative 
Assembly of Manitoba — Elected to the Dominion Parliament for Selkirk — His Interest in 
the Canadian Pacific Railway — Deserts the Conservative Party — Out of Sympathy with the 
Mackenzie Railway Policy— Returns to the Conservative Party — The Canadian Pac.fic 
Railway Completed — His Generous Gifts to Montreal — Knighted — Elected to Parliament 
for Montreal West — His Interest in the Manitoba School Question — Appointed High 
Commissioner for Canada — Made a Peer of the Realm — ^In the House of Lords — The 
Strathcona's Horse — A Great Empire Builder. 

THE career of Donald Alexander Smith., Lord Strathcona and Mount 
Royal, gives a good illustration of the possibilities a new country 
afifords for a man of ability, enterprise and dogged determination. 
His rise to influence and wealth, when it began, was rapid and kept pace with 
the country's prosperity ; indeed, the two worked together. Donald Smith 
more than any other man of business insight made Canada what she is 
to-day, and Canada has abundantly rewarded him for his enterprise on her 
behalf; and what he has received he gives back in no stinted measure^ 
but with a generosity and wisdom without a parallel among English 
philanthropists. 

Lord Strathcona was born August 6, 1820, at the little town of Forres, 
in Scotland, the town near whicli ^lacbeth met the witches on the " blasted 
heath." His mother was Barbara Stewart, a woman of more than ordinary 
482 



LORD STRATHCONA. 486 

intelligence and ambition for her children. She was familiar with the 
conditions of life in Canada as her brother, John Stewart, a fiir-trader of 
renown, was one of the most striking figures in the West during the early- 
years of the nineteenth century. He had travelled to the Pacific with Simon 
Fraser, the discoverer of the Fraser River, and knew thoroughly the far West 
and the conditions there. He was an employee of the Hudson's Bay 
Company and held the position of Chief Factor at Lesser Slave Lake. His 
sister, like the great majority of Scotch mothers, was anxious that her boy 
should enter one of the learned professions, but she could not refrain from 
sounding the praises of her brave and adventurous brother. Young Smith 
drank in the stories of mountain and plain, of the adventures of the fur- 
traders on rushing rivers and with Indian tribes, and the wonders of the 
West took possession of his young imagination. 

He was sent to school at an early age in the town of Forres and received 
a fair education. He early had his mind directed towards the law, and when 
his education was considered sufficiently advanced he began his legal studies 
in the office of Mr. Robert Watson, the town clerk of his native place. He 
was, however, to have but a short experience of the law, for his illustrious 
uncle, the fur-trader, found time to pay a visit to Scotland and the whole 
course of Donald Smith's life was changed. 

His uncle, accustomed to the freedom of the great West, no doubt had a 
feeling of pity for his sturdy young nephew who was spending his youthful 
years digging into musty tomes in a narrow law office. He knew the 
opportunities a young man with a vigorous constitution and intelligence had 
in the employ of the Hudson's Bay Company, and so worked on his nephew 
that all Donald Smith's thoughts were soon directed to America. His uncle 
had influence and offered him a junior clerkship in the service of the Hudson's 
Bay Company. Donald Smith was then but eighteen years old and with the 
ardour of youth made preparations for his new life in the West, which was to 
the minds of Europeans in the early part of the nineteenth century what 
darkest Africa is to-day, — a region where hardships must be endured and 
where prizes are won by the few but when won prove well worth the 
seeking. 
26 



486 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

The uncle and nephew sailed for Canada in 1838 and after a stormy 
passage of nearly fifty days arrived at Montreal. They reached Canada at a 
critical moment. The fiery agitation of "William Lyon Mackenzie and 
Papineau had caused rebellion to break out, and in both Upper and Lower 
Canada the sword had been drawn. It was found necessary to proclaim 
martial law in the country, and what is now known as the Province of 
Quebec was in the hands of the soldiers. This was not a very promising 
outlook, but it did not afiect Donald Smith seriously as he had come to the 
countrj^ to serve, not under the Canadian government, but under that entirely 
distinct institution, the Hudson's Bay Company. 

The governor of this celebrated Company was, at this time, George 
Simpson, who waa to be knighted in 1841 for his excellent work done in the 
interests of science and discovery in British North America. He ruled those 
under him as an absolute monarch might rule, and was indeed known as the 
" King of the Fur-Traders " and the " Emperor of the Plains." Although a 
stern disciplinarian, he had ever at heart his duty towards the Company 
and the Empire. Like Donald Smith, he was a Scotchman, and had served 
a hard apprenticeship in the wilds of the West, and knew what those under 
him had to endure and their needs. He did probably more than any other 
man to give the world a knowledge of the northern part of this continent 
He aided Franklin, Richardson, Ross, Back and others in their explorations, 
and sent out and befriended many other explorers, mich as Dease, Thomas 
Simpson, Rae, Anderson and Stewart. Under him the Hudson*8 Bay 
Company prospered, but it did so only through his close application to its 
interests. "When young Smith arrived in Canada he was residing at 
liachine sending forth men to look after the interests of the Company in the 
wide district from Labrador to the Rocky Mountains. Donald Smith, no 
doubt, desired to be sent up the Ottawa and along the great waterways to the 
West of which he had heard so much from his uncle ; but it was not to be. 
Governor Simpson needed a youth of his stamp in the diflScult region of the 
Labrador, and so it was decided to send him to that bleak and desolate 
region — a region which had appeared to Jacques Cartier as the land alloted 



LORD STRATHCONA. 487 

to Cain. It had lost none of its bleakness, and when young Smith made 
ready for his long trip to his post he must have felt as if he were going to 
the end of the world. 

The hardships of his journey to his new home were as nothing to the 
hardships he was forced to endure in that desolate region of the far North of 
Canada. The Factor in the Labrador Department was a Scotchman like 
himself, and gave him a warm welcome and listened with delight to the news 
from the old land and from Canada, from which places he had not heard for 
many months. Young Smith made the best of his new sphere of activity. 
He had taken to heart Touchstone's immortal words, " travellers must be 
content " ; and when not busy with official duties filled in the time canoeing, 
boating, fishing and shooting ; storing up a strength that was, despite the 
hardships he endured, to make him mentally and physically one of the 
strongest men of his time. 

He had a warm affection for Forres, and often nnburdened his heart by 
writing long letters to his mother — letters that showed considerable literary 
power. These letters could only be forwarded at long intervals. It was over 
one thousand miles of dreary road from his post to Quebec On several 
occasions he made this distance on foot and in a dog-sled. It is little wonder 
that the man who could do this saw in the Rocky Mountains no 
insurmountable obstacles when the Canadian Pacific Railway took shape in 
his brain. 

On many occasions his duties called him to remote and dangerous 
regions. He several times narrowly escaped death fi-om exposure, but, canny 
Scot as he was, he always carried with him a sufficient supply of furs to 
protect him from the fiercest winter storms. He thoroughly adapted himself 
to his environment and position, and was quite capable of ministering to the 
spiritual and physical needs of the Indians and Esquimos, and sometimes 
when the employees of the Company married Esquimo women he officiated 
at the marriage ceremony. 

The hardships he had undergone affected his sight and he was attacked 
by color blindness. He was afraid of becoming totally blind and determined 
to consult an oculist. To do this he would have to journey to Montreal. 



488 BUILDEES OF CANADA. 

According to the rules of the Company he should first have obtained leave of 
absence, but as he felt his need an urgent one he determined to journey to 
Montreal without permission. Before he reached the city he was met by Sir 
George Simpson, who at once enquired who gave him leave of absence, and 
ordered him back to his post. Donald Smith felt very much like quitting 
the service of the company on the spot, but had he done so all the hard years 
he had put in would practically have been wasted, and so he journeyed back to 
Ungava over the weary road. On the trip back to Labrador the two half- 
breed guides who accompanied him died from exposure, and he himself 
narrowly escaped with his life. 

For thirteen long years he toiled in this dreary region, but at length 
promotion came and he was given the chief-trad ership. In 1868 he was 
made chief executive officer of the Company in North America, and was to be 
stationed in Montreal. 

Mr. Smith was scarcely installed in his new office befo're he was to 
receive a severe test. In the Red River Settlement there was much discontent, 
and malcontents were endeavoring to have the great North-West severed from 
the rule of the Hudson's Bay Company. Mr. Smith early saw that there was 
trouble ahead. He knew that the Dominion Government intended to have 
Rupert's Land transferred to Canada, and he knew likewise that many of the 
employees of the company and the inhabitants of the West were opposed to 
such a course. There was much division of opinion as to what should be 
done with the West, and not a few desired annexation to the United States, 
while other ambitious ones hoped to see a republic established in the North- 
West. 

In 1869 the Company surrendered their interests in the North-West to 
Canada for £300,000, one-twentieth of the fertile belt and forty-five thousand 
acres adjoining the trading posts of the Company. Mr. Macdougall, Minister 
of Public Works, had gone to England with M. Cartier to negotiate with the 
Company, and when the transfer was consummated he was appointed 
Governor of the newly-acquired territory. The people of the North-West did 
not understand the situation and were in a greatly excited condition. It was 
a time for the presence of a shrew 1 T^-rin, and Governor Macdougall was far 






;3d~%"'* 





LORD STRATHCONA. 491 

from being that. He attempted to ride rough-shod over their wishes and as 
a result was prevented from entering Rupert's Land. A rebelHon broke out 
and Louis Riei led the rebel forces, and arrested and confined in Fort Garry 
all whom he con.sidered his enemies, hoisting a new flag over the fort and 
assuming the title of President. Mr. Donald A. Smith of the Hudson's Bay 
Company saw how serious was the situation, and having confidence in his own 
strength determined, in the interests of the company, to journey to the Red 
River. Sir John Macdonald saw what a tangle Macdougall had made of 
afi'airs, and saw, too, that the only man likely to peacefully unravel it was 
Mr. Smith. He therefore determined to strengthen his hand in dealing with 
the inhabitants ;and appointed him a Commissioner from the Dominion 
Government. 

His commission authorized him " to inquire into the causes, nature and 
extent of the obstruction offered at the Red River, in the North-West 
Territories, to the peaceable ingress of the Honorable William Macdougall 
and other parties authorized by our Governor-General of Canada to proceed 
into the same ; and also to inquire into the causes and discontent and 
dissatisfaction alleged to exist in respect to the proposed union of the said 
North-West Territories with the Dominion of Canada; and further to explain 
to the inhabitants of the said countiy the principles on which the 
government of Canada intends to administer the government of the country 
according to such instructions as maybe given to you by our Governor-in- 
Council in this behalf; and to take steps to remove any misapprehensions 
which may exist in respect to the mode of government of the same ; and to 
report to our Governor-General the result of such inquiries and on the best 
mode of quieting and removing such discontent and dissatisfaction^ and also 
to report on the most proper and fitting mode for effecting the speedy transfer 
of the country and government from the authority of the Hudson's Bay 
Company to the government of Canada with the general consent of the 
inhabitants. 

"And further, to consider and report on the most advisable mode of 
dealing with the Indian tribes in the North-West Territories." 



492 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

His mission was one that required shrewdness and courage. The people 
he was going amongst believed that they were being betrayed, and their 
leader, Riel, was a man of considerable intelligence, unscrupulous and cruel. 
On more than one occasion at Fort Garry, Donald Smith's life seemed in 
jeopardy, but he never flinched or showed signs of weakness, and in 
shrewdness proved himself more than a match for Riel. His work was 
eminently successful, and before he returned to Canada to report on the 
mission, he had caused so many of the supporters of Riel to lose confidence in 
their leader and desert him, that when the army under General Wolseley 
invaded the country to suppress the rebellion it found no insurgents in 
arms. 

Mr. Smith's report of his mission to the Secretary of State, Hon. Joseph 
Howe, modestly, and with fulness of detail, shows the dangers he encountered 
and the thoroughness of his work : 

** Leaving Ottawa on the 13th of December last, I reached St. Cloud, the 
terminus of railway communication, on the 17th, continuing on the same day 
by stage, and arriving at Abercrombie on the evening of the 19th. Here we 
had to abandon wheeled carriages, and procuring a sleigh, after a couple of 
hours' rest, we resumed the journey, and on the afternoon of the 21st met 
Hon. Mr. Macdougall and party about thirty miles beyond Georgetown, 
From him I learned how serious the aspect of affairs had latterly become at 
Red River, and pushing on, we got to Pembina about 11 p. m. of the 24th 
and to Fort Garry on the 27th. 

" The gate of the fort we found open, but guarded by several armed men, 
who, on my desiring to be shown to Governor Mactavish's house, requested 
me to wait till they could communicate with their chief. In a short time Mr. 
Louis Riel appeared. I announced my name. He said he had heard of my 
arrival at Pembina, and was about to send off a party to bring me in. I then 
accompanied him to a room occupied by ten or a dozen men, whom he 
introduced to me as members of the * provisional government.' He requested 
to know the purport of my visit, to which I replied in substance that I was 
connected with the Hudson's Bay Company, but also held a Commission from 
tile Canadian government to the people of Red River, and would be prepared to 



LORD STRATHCONjL. 493 

show my credentials as soon as they (the people) were willing to receive me. 
I was then asked to take oath not to attempt to leave the fort that night, nor to 
upset their government, legally estabhshed. This request I peremptorily refused 
to comply with, but said that, being very tired, I had no desire to go outside the 
gate that night, and promised to take no immediate steps forcibly to upset 
the so-called * provisional government,' legal or illegal as it might be, without 
first announcing my intention to do so, Mr. Kiel taking exception to the 
word « illegal,' while I insisted on retaining it. Mr. O'Donoghue, to get over 
the diflBculty remarked, * That is as he (meaning myself) understands it/ to 
which I replied 'Precisely so.' The above explanation I am the more 
particular in giving as it has been reported that I at once acknowledged the 
'provisional Government' to be legal. Neither then nor afterwards did 
I do so. 

" I took up my quarters in one of the houses occupied by the Hudson's 
Bay Company's officers, and from that date till towards the end of February 
was virtually a prisoner within the fort, although with permission to go 
outside the walls for exercise accompanied by two armed guards, a privilege 
of which I never availed myself. 

" All my official papers had been left in charge of Mr. Provencher at 
Pembina, as I had been warned that, if found in my possession, they would 
unquestionably be seized, as were those brought into the settlement shortly 
after by the Rev. M. Thibault and Colonel de Salaberry. 

" The state of matters at this time in and around Fort Garry was most 
unsatisfactory and truly humiliating. Upwards of sixty British subjects were 
held in close confinement as ' political prisoners ' ; security for persons or 
property there was none ; the fort with its large supplies of ammunition, 
provisions, and stores of all kinds, was in the possession of a few hundred 
French half-breeds, whose leaders had declared their determination to use 
every effort for the purpose of annexing the territory to the United States, and 
the Governor and Council of Assiniboia were powerless to enforce the law. 

" On the 6th of January I saw Mr. Kiel, and soon came to the conclusion 
that no good could arise from entering into any negotiations with his 
' Council,' even were we to admit their authority, which I was not prepared 



4[>4 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

to do. We learned that on the 13th the Grand Vicar Thibault and Colonel 
de Salaberry appeared before the ' President and Council of the People,' 
when some explanations and compliments were exchanged, after which the 
very reverend gentleman and his associate were politely bowed out and lost 
sight ofl 

" Meantime, we had frequent visits in the fort from some of the most 
influential and most reliable men in the settlement, who gladly made known 
to the people generally the liberal intentions of the Canadian government, 
and in consequence one after another of Eiel's councillors seceded from him^ 
and being joined by their friends and many of their compatriots and 
co-religionists, who had throughout held aloof from the insurgents, they 
determined no longer to Bubmit to his dictation. This change evidently had 
a marked effect upon Kiel, causing him to alter his tactics and profess a 
desire for an accommodation with Canada. Accordingly, on the 14th of 
January, he called on me, informed me that he had seen Messrs. Thibault 
and de Salaberry, whose instructions did not authorize them to give 
assurances that the people would be secured in possession of their rights on 
entering into the Confederation, their errand being merely 'to calm the 
French half-breeds.* He then aaked to see my commission, and on my 
explaining that owing entirely to the action taken by himself it was not in 
my possession, in an excited yet faltering manner he said, * Yes, I know, 'tis 
a great pity ; but how soon could you have it ?' ' Probably in five or six 
days,* I replied. * That is too long, far too long,* he responded, and then 
asked where the documents were deposited, requesting at the same timie a 
written order for their delivery to his messenger. To this I would not accede, 
but on his assuring me that they would be delivered into my hands, and that 
I should be afforded an opportunity of communicating their contents to the 
people, I consented to send a friend for them. It was so decided, and 
immediately after the messenger had received his instructions from me I waa 
placed under strict arrest, a captain's guard being assigned me, whose 
instructions were not to lose sight of me, day or night, and prevent me from 
communicating either verbally or in writing with any individual. I 



LORD STRATH(X>NA- ^7 

protested, saying, 'Am T to consider myself a prisoner?' He replied, 
'Certainly not; I have the utmost confidence in your honour but 
circumstances demand this.' 

" It was now about ten o'clock, and my messenger having been marched 
out, I retired to bed, but only to be awakened twixt two or three o'clock in 
the morning of the 15th by Mr. Kiel, who, with a guard, stood by the bedside 
and again demanded a written order for the delivery of my official papers, 
which I again peremptorily refused to give. 

''The well-effected French party became aware of what had happened, 
and not believing in Kiel's good faith, determined to prevent the papers from 
falling into his hands. They got together some sixty or eighty men, who 
met my friend on his way back, and were escorting him, when on the 18th, 
about ten miles from the fort, they were accosted by Riel and some of his 
party and by Rev. Mr. Richot. An altercation took place. Riel attempted 
to use his pistol, saying ' he would not be taken alive in his own country,' on 
which a revolver was levelled at his head, and Mr. Richot having interposed, 
he was unceremoniously told to stand aside and * not to interfere any further 
with matters unconnected with his spiritual duties.' It may be well to note 
that all those who took part in this affair were Catholics, and, with one or two 
exceptions, French half-breeds. Nothing more serious happened at this time, 
and the party proceeded together to Fort Garry, where they arrived in the 
forenoon. A few minutes before th«y entered the house, the Very Rev. Mr. 
Thibault, PSre Lestanc, and Colonel de Salaberry called upon me, and with 
the exception of my guard, they were the first individuals with whom I was 
permitted to converse since the 14th. They appeared to be much concerned, 
and said it was currently reported that I had been endeavouring to incite the 
different parties to hostile collisions. I repudiated any such charge, 
explaining that I had acted only in the cause of peace and order, and with 
the desire of making the people, both French and English, fully acquainted 
with the liberal views of the Canadian Government, so that a peaceful 
transfer of the territory might be effected, adding that I was pleased to think 
there was every likelihood this would speedily be accomplished. In the 
meantime the party in possession of my papers entered the adjoining room, 



- i. 



498 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

in which P^re Lestanc joined them, while Messrs. Thibault and de Salaberry 
went outside. Immediately after they retired Mr. Riel came to me saying, 
' Your commission is here, but in the hands of men who have no right to 
have it.' I expressed satisfaction that it had been brought in, and said, 
being now in possession of it I must be relieved from all restraint, and be 
permitted freely to communicate with the people. He at once removed the 
guard, and we went up to the party who had just arrived. Messrs. Riel and 
O'Donoghue with a few of their friends were present, and vehemently 
protested against the action now being taken, while the ex-councillors 
accused them of treason to the Imperial Crown, and of using every effort to 
bring about the annexation of the country to the United States. Riel 
replied that was only supposing the people desired it, but he was willing the 
question should be submitted to them. P^re Lestanc spoke warmly in 
favour of the * President,' who, he said, had acted so as to merit the gratitude 
of his countrymen, and begged them to still place confidence in him. This 
evidently had no effect, and ultimately, after a good deal of recrimination, 
it was arranged that a meeting of the inhabitants from all parts of the 
settlement should be called for the morrow, the 19th, at which the papers 
bearing on the subject should be read, a guard of forty men remaining in the 
house to insure the safe-keeping of the documents. 

" Riel's men were now falling away from him, while the loyal party 
expressed their determination no longer to be guided in the matter either by 
him or P^re Lestanc and his associates. They were full of hope and 
confident that the following day would bring with it complete success to the 
cause of Canada. 

"Late that night P^re Lestanc paid them another visit, which was 
prolonged for several hours beyond midnight, and next morning it was 
found that a majority of those who had seceded from Riel were again on 
friendly terms with him. The hour for the meeting having arrived, upwards 
of a thousand people attended, and deeming it of great importance that the 
explanation to be made on behalf of the Canadian Government should be 
faithfully rendered to the French-speaking portion of the settlers, whose 
leaders had studiously withheld from them all knowledge of the true state of 



LORD STRATHCONA. 499 

matters in connection with the proposed transfer of the country, I requested 
Colonel de Salaberry to act as interpreter ; but the Colonel, diffident of his 
own ability as a translator, proposed Mr. Riel aa an interpreter, and the 
latter was appointed accordingly. 

" At this meeting, and that held the following day, the reading of the 
Commission, the Queen's letter, and every other document was contested with 
much obstinacy, but ultimately carried ; and threats were used to myself in 
the presence and hearing of the chairman, of the secretary. Judge Black and 
others, more especially by Mr. Riel and Rev. Mr. Lestanc. At the 
commencement of the meeting I requested the chairman and those near him 
to begin by insisting that all arms should be laid down, and that the flag 
then flying (fleur-de-lis and shamrock) should be replaced by the British 
ensign. This they thought would come better at an after-stage ; but the 
opportunity of doing so, now lost, never recurred. 

" As is generally known, the result of the meeting was the appointment 
of forty delegates, twenty from either side, to meet on the 25th January, ' with 
the object of considering the subject of Mr. Smith's commission and to decide 
what would be best for the welfare of the country,* the English as a body 
and a large number of French declaring their entire satisfaction with the 
explanation, given and their earnest desire for union with Canada. 

" On the 22nd Riel had several conferences with the well-affected French 
within the fort ; he was melted even to tears, told them how earnestly he 
desired an arrangement with Canada, and assured them he would lay down 
his authority immediately on the meeting of the Convention. They believed 
him sincere, and although I considered that their guard in the fort should 
not be decreased, they held that ten men would be amply sufficient to leave 
while they went to secure their elections. The consequence was that they 
had hardly gone when repressive measures were resorted to, and the Hudson's 
Bay Company's stores, which had hitherto been only partially in their 
hands, were now takon complete possession of by RieL 

" Efforts were made to have the prisoners released, but without 
effect. 



500 BUILDERS OP CANADA. 

" The delegates met on the 25th and continued in session till the 10th 
February. On the 26th I handed to their chairman, Judge Black, the 
documents read at the meetings on the 19th and 20th January, and on the 
27th attended the Convention by appointment. I was received with much 
cordiality by all the delegates, explained to them the views of the Canadian 
Government, and gave assurances that on entering the confederation they 
would be secured in the possession of all rights, privileges, and immunities 
enjoyed by British subjects in other parts of the Dominion ; but on being 
requested by Mr. Kiel to give an opinion regarding a certain * List of Rights ' 
prepared by his party in December last, I declined to do so, thinking it better 
that the present Convention should place in my hands a paper stating their 
wishes, to which I should ' be happy to give such assurances as I believed 
would be in accordance with the views of the Canadian Government.' The 
Convention then set about the task of preparing a ' List of Rights ' embodying 
the conditions under which they would be willing to enter the Confederation. 
While the discussion regarding this list was going on, Mr. Riel called on me 
and asked if the Canadian Government would consent to receive them as a 
province. My reply was that I could not speak with any degree of certainty 
on the subject as it had not been referred to when I was at Ottawa, the 
intention then being that the North-West should in the first instance be 
incorporated under the Dominion as a territory ; but I added no doubt it 
would become a province within two or three years. On this Mr. Riel, with 
much emphasis, exclaimed, * Then the Hudson's Bay Company is not safe 
yet r To which I answered, ' Mr. Riel, that cannot influence me in the 
slightest degree, and I am quite prepared to act as may be required of me in 
my capacity as Canadian Commissioner.' This was on the evening of the 
3rd of February. On the following day the proposition to enter as a province 
was negatived by the Convention, and on the 5th another motion, directed 
against the Hudson's Bay Company, also failed, the language used by Mr. 
Riel on the latter occasion having been violent in the extreme. The same 
evening Riel proceeded to Governor Mactavish, who had been dangerously 
ill for many weeks back, and heaping reproaches and insult upon him, 
declared that he would have him shot before midnight Riel then sought 





a. -^ 



II 
5 S 



LORD 8TRATHC0NA. 508 

out Dr. Cowan, the officer in immediate charge of Red River District, 
upbraided him for his persistent opposition to ' the people,' the insurgents, 
and declaring that his name would go down with infamy to posterity for the 
part he had taken, demanded that he would immediately swear allegiance 
to the 'provisional Government' or prepare for death within three hours, 
giving him a quarter of an hour for consideration. The Doctor immediately 
replied that he knew no legal authority in the country but that of Great 
Britain to which his allegiance was due, and that he would not take the oath> 
required of him. He was then seized and put in confinement along with the 
prisoners taken in December last. I was also put under strict charge, but 
not removed from the house. Notwithstanding this and the painful doubt 
created in the minds of the English members of the Convention as to the 
course they should pursue after these arrests, the delegates again met on the 
7th. On the 5th they had placed in my hands the 'List of Rights' they 
had drawn up, which was done at eleven o'clock on the 7th with an 
intimation that the Convention would be glad to meet at one o'clock p. m., 
the intervening two hours being allowed me to frame my answers. In' 
drawing up these I was allowed no reference to any document, either written 
or printed, except the 'List of Rights,' and a guard stood over me to see 
that I should write nothing else than that to be presented to the Convention. 
I had just finislicd writing when Mr. Riel and his Adjutant-General, Lepine, 
who was also a member of the Convention, came in ; and Riel, looking at the 
latter in a significant manner, said, 'The answers to the 'List of Rights' 
must be simply 'yes' or 'no.' On this I remarked that I thought 
otherwise, and would act as circumstances might appear to me to require. I 
then retired, and on returning to the room a few minutes later, found there 
Mr. Riel, the Rev. Mr. Thibault and Colonel de Salaberry. We proceeded 
together to the Convention and in course of conversation Colonel de Salaberry 
said he would gladly have come to see me before, but could not, as he had 
been a prisoner throughout. 

"The proceedings of the Convention, as reported in the New Nation 
newspaper of the 11th and 18th of February, copies of which I have had the 
honour of addressing to you, are sufficiently exact, and render it unnecessary 



504 BUILDERS OP CANADA. 

for me here to enter into details. 'Suffice it to say that a large majority of 
the delegates expressed entire satisfaction with the answers to their * List of 
Rights,' and professed confidence in the Canadian Government, to which I 
invited them to send delegates, with the view of effecting a speedy transfer of 
the territory to the Dominion, an invitation received with acclamation and 
unanimously accepted, as will appear by resolution hereto annexed, along 
with the * List of Rights,' and my answer to the same. The delegates were 
named John Black, Esq., Recorder, the Rev. Mr. Richot, and Mr. Alfred H. 
Scott, a good deal of opposition having been offered to the election of the last 
named of the three. 

"The proceedings of this Convention came to a close on the 10th of 
February by the nomination of the 'provisional Government,' in the 
formation of which several of the delegates declined to take any part. 
Governor Mactavish, Dr. Cowan, and two or three other persons were then 
released, and the Hudson's Bay Company's officers again allowed to come 
and go at pleasure ; but I was still confined to the fort, Riel, as he expressly 
stated to Judge Black, being apprehensive of my influence with the people in 
the approaching election. Riel promised that all the prisoners should soon 
be released. On the 11th and 12th six or eight of them were set at liberty, 
and Dr. Cowan was informed in my presence that as they were all to be 
discharged without delay, the rooms they had occupied would be placed at 
his disposal in a day or two, Riel remarking at the same time that he would 
have them thoroughly cleaned out. 

" Rumours now began to circulate of a rising at the Portage, and on the 
nights of the 14th and 15th of February some eighty or one hundred ■ men 
from that district passed down close to Fort Garry and proceeded to Kildonan, 
where they were joined by from 300 to 350 men, principally English half- 
breeds from the lower parts of the settlement. Had these men, properly 
armed and organized, been prepared to support the well-affected French party, 
when the latter took action about the middle of January or even in the 
beginning of February, during the sitting of the Convention, order might 
have been restored and the transfer to Canada provided for without the 
necessity of firing a single shot; but now -the rising was not only rash but 



LORD STRATHCONA. 505 

purposeless, as, without its intervention, the prisoners would unquestionably 
have been released. The party was entirely unorganized, indifferently 
armed, unprovided with food, even for one meal, and wholly incapable of 
coping with the French now re-united, who, to the number of at least 700, 
were prepared to offer the most determined resistance, which, as they were 
in possession of a number of guns (six and three-pounders), ample stores of 
ammunition, provisions, and every other requisite, they could have done 
most effectually. My sympathies were, in a great measure, with the Portage 
men, whom I believe to have been actuated by the best of motives; but 
under the circumstances it was not difficult to foresee that the issue could not 
be otherwise than disastrous to their cause. The attempt was therefore to be 
deplored, as it resulted in placing the whole settlement at the feet of Kiel. 
The great majority of settlers, English and Scotch, discountenanced the 
movement, and bitterly complained of those who had set it on foot 
Forty-seven of the party were captured on their way home while passing 
within a few hundred yards of the fort. The explanation I have heard given 
for their otherwise inexplicable conduct in having taken this route, instead of 
making a detour, which should have insured safety, being a supposed 
promise by Kiel that they should be permitted to pass unmolested. Their 
messenger, a young man named McLean, on being questioned by Archdeacon 
McLean and myself in the presence of Mr. Gardner and one or two other 
gentlemen, admitted that Riel, on being asked if the party would be 
permitted to pass, was silent and only on being informed that they intended 
next day to use the route just outside the town remarked, ' Ah, that is good.' 
And for his purpose it, no doubt, was so. Captain Boulton led the party, 
and he and his friends at the Portage assured me that he exerted himself to 
the utmost to keep them from rising, and only joined them ot tho last 
moment when he saw they were determined to go forward. He v/as ca//tu.red 
on the 17th, tried by court-martial and condemned to be shot at noor. ',';a 'che 
following day ; but at the intercession of the Lord Bishop of Rupei''/// I^and, 
Archdeacon McLean, and in short, every influential man among the "/.'nglish, 
and I have been told, also at the earnest entreaty of the Catholic c^jgy, the 
execution was delayed till midnight of Saturday the 19th. Further than 



&Ut) BUILDERS OF CATSTADA. 

this, Riel declared he could not, would not yield, except, indeed, Dr. Schultz 
should be captured in the meantime, in which case he would be shot instead 
of Boulton. Archdeacon McLean had been in close attendance on Captain 
Boulton for twenty-four hours, had administered to him the Sacrament, 
received his last commands, and had promised to be present with him at the 
last moment ; and when I met the Archdeacon on my way to see Riel, about 
eight o'clock on the evening of the 19th, he was deeply affected, and had 
given up all hope. I found with Eiel Mr. H. N. Robinson, of the New Nation 
newspaper, and shortly after Mr. James Ross, Chief Justice, entered, followed 
in a few minutes by Mr. Bannatyne, Postmaster, who had been ordered to 
bring the key of the mail-bag, which Riel opened, and examining the letters, 
perused and retained one or more. Mr. Ross pleaded for Boulton, but was 
repulsed in the most contemptuous manner. I had already been speaking to 
Riel on the subject when interrupted by Mr. Rosa' entrance, and now 
resumed the conversation. Riel was obdurate and said that the English 
settlers and Canadians, but more especially the latter, had laughed at and 
despised the French half-breeds, believing that they would not dare to take 
the life of anyone, and that under these circumstances it would be impossible 
to have peace and establish order in the country. An example must therefore 
be made, and he had firmly resolved that Boulton's execution should be 
carried out, bitterly as he deplored the necessity for doing so. I reasoned 
with him long and earnestly, until at length about ten o'clock he yielded, 
and addressing me, apparently with much feeling, said, * Hitherto I have 
been deaf to all entreaties, and in now granting you this man's life,' or words 
to that effect, * may I ask you a favor T ' Anything,' I replied, * tbat in 
honour I can do.* He continued : * Canada has disunited us ; you will use 
your influence to unite us ? You can do so, and without this it must be war — \ 
bloody civil war I' I answered that, as I had on first coming to the country, 
I would now repeat, ' I would give my whole heart to effect a peaceable union 
of the country with Canada.' 

" ' We want only our just rights as British subjects,' he continued, ' and 
we want the English to join us simply to obtain these.' * Then,' I remarked, 
* I shall at once see them and induce tbem to go on with the election of 



LORD STRATHCONA. 509 

delegates for that purpose' ; and he replied, 'If you can do this war will be 
avoided. Not only the lives, but the libertj'' of all the prisoners will be 
secured, for on your success depends the lives of all the Canadians in the 
country.' He immediately proceeded to the prison, and intimated to 
A^rchdeacon McLean that he had been induced by me to spare Captain 
Boulton's life, and had further promised to me that immediately on the 
meeting of the Council shortly to be elected the whole of the prisoners should 
be released, requesting the Archdeacon at the same time to explain the 
circumstances to Captain Boulton and the other prisoners. The moment was 
a fearful one for the settlement. Every man's life was in the hands of Riel, 
and fully appreciating the significance of this, the Bishop of Rupert's Land 
and the Protestant clergy generally, now earnestly counselled the people to 
elect the delegates without loss of time, as by this means they might to some 
extent control the course of , events, while otherwise they were utterly 
powerless. I entirely concurred in this view of the case, and Archdeacon 
McLean having kindly offered to accompany me, we visited the different 
parts of the settlement, and found that in several parishes the people and 
those most loyal to the British Crown and most desirous for union with Canada 
had already chosen their councillors. I explained to all that the Council 
was to be provisional, in the strictest sense of the word, intended expressly 
for effecting the transference of the country to Canada, and for ensuring the 
safety of life and property in the meantime. In some instances I found they 
had drawn up petitions to Mr. Riel, as ' President,' expressing submission, 
etc. These I requested them to destroy, advising that nothing more should 
be done than under the circumstances was absolutely necessary, namely, that 
having made their election, they should intimate the fact m formal terms to 
Mr. Bunn, who had been named Secretary of the Council, and not Mr. Riel. 
The elections in the English parishes having taken place on the 26th 
February, I again saw Riel, who reassured me that all the prisoners would be 
released within a day or two after the first meeting of the Council. On the 
28th he again sent for me and in the presence of Mr. Eraser, delegate from 
the Scotch parish, Kildonan, repeated his promise that the lives of the 

prisoners were secured, and that their release would shortly follow. 

27 



610 BUILDERS OP CAjSTADA. 

"I had no further communication with Riel until Monday, the 4th 
March, when about ten o'clock in the morning P^re Lestanc called on me. 
^e informed me of Bishop Tache's expected arrival— not later certainly than 
the 8th, and probably some days earlier — adding that his lordship had 
telegraphed to request that if about to leave for Canada I should defer my 
departure till he could communicate personally with me. He then said that 
the 'conduct of the prisoners was very unsatisfactory, that they were very 
unruly, insolent to the * soldiers,' and their behaviour altogether so very bad 
that he was afraid the guards might be forced to retaliate in self-defence.' 
I expressed much surprise at the information he gave, as the prisoners, without 
exception, had promised to Archdeacon McLean and myself that, seeing 
their helpless condition, they would endeavour to act so as to avoid giving 
offence to their guards, and we encouraged them to look forward to be 
speedily released in fulfilment of the promise made by Mr. Riel. One man, 
Parker, was mentioned as having made himself particularly obnoxious by his 
violent conduct ; but not one word was said on this occasion regarding Scott, 
or the slightest intimation given that he or any other person had been 
condemned to be shot. About eleven o'clock P^re Lestanc left me and went 
upstairs to communicate to Governor Mactavish, as he said, ' the good news 
that Bishop Tach6 was expected so soon.' The Rev. Mr. Young, Methodist 
clergyman, had just entered the house, and meeting the P^re in the hall, 
conversed with him a few minutes. Mr. Young then came up to me, and 
from him I had the first intimation that it was -intended to shoot Thomas 
Scott, and that the sentence was to be carried into effect at twelve o'clock 
noon that day. We agreed in believing that the thing was too monstrous to 
be possible, and Mr. Young mentioned that poor Scott himself was equally 
incredulous on the subject, thinking they merely intended to frighten him. 
However, even to keep him in suspense was of itself a horrible cruelty, and it 
was arranged that as Mr. Young had been sent for to attend the man, he 
should see Riel, ascertain exactly how the matter stood, and if really serious 
to let me know at once. Mr. Young accordingly called on Riel, was informed 
that Scott had been condemned, that the sentence was irrevocable and would 
not be delayed one minute beyond noon. Mr. Young begged for delay, saying 



LOKD STBATHCONA. 611 

'the man is not prepared to die'; but all without avail. He was paralyzed 
with horror, returned to the prisoner, and immediately sent a messenger to 
inform me of the result of his visit. I determined to find out Riel 
immediately, but recollecting that P^re Lestanc was still upstairs with Mr. 
Mactavish, went to him, related what I had heard, and asked him if he knew 
anything about the matter. His answer I cannot give in precise words, but 
it was to the effect that they had seen Mr. Kiel on the other side (St. Boniface) 
and had all spoken to him about it, by which I understood that they had 
interceded for Scott. Governor Mactavish was greatly shocked on being 
informed of Kiel's purpose, and joined in reprobating it. P^re Lestanc 
consented to accompany me, and we called on Kiel. When we entered he 
asked me, * What news from Canada?' The mail had arrived the preceding 
day, and I replied, ' Only the intelligence that Bishop Tache will be here 
very soon.' I then mentioned what I had heard regarding Scott, and before 
Kiel answered Pdre Lestanc interposed in French words, meaning, ' Is there 
no way of escape ?' Riel replied to him, ' My Rev. Pere, you know exactly 
how the matter stands ' ; then turning to me he said, * I will explain to you,' 
speaking at first in English, but shortly afterwards using French, remarking 
to me, 'You understand that language?' He said, in substance, that Scott 
had throughout been a troublesome character, had been the ringleader in a 
rising against Mr, Snow, who had charge of the party employed by the 
Canadian Government during the preceding summer in road-making ; that he 
had risen against the ' provisional Government ' in December last ; that his 
life was then spared ; that he escaped, had again been taken in arms, and once 
more pardoned, referring, no doubt, to the promise he had made to me, that 
the lives and liberty of all the prisoners were secured, but that he was 
incorrigible and quite incapable of appreciating the clemency with which he 
had been treated ; that he was rough and abusive to the guards and insulting 
to him, Mr. Kiel ; that his example had been productive of the very worst 
effects on the other prisoners, who had become insubordinate to such an 
extent that it was difficult to withhold the guards from retaliating. 

" He further said, ' I sat down with Scott as we are doing now, and asked 
him truthfully to tell me — as I would not use his statement against him— 



612 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

what he and the Portage people intended to have done with me had they 
succeeded in capturing me when they surrounded Conture's house,' to which 
he replied, * We intended to keep you as a hostage for the safety of the 
prisoners.' I argued with Riel and endeavoured to show that some of the 
circumstances he had mentioned, and especially the last, were very strong 
reasons to urge why Scott's life should not be sacrificed, and that if, as he 
represented, Scott was a rash, thoughtless man, whom none cared to have 
anything to do with, no evil need be apprehended from his example. I 
pointed out that the one great merit claimed for the insurrection was that so 
far it had been bloodless, except in one sad instance, which all were willing 
to look upon as an accident, and implored him not now to stain it, 
to burden it with what would be considered a horrible crime. He 
exclaimed, * We must make Canada respect us.' I replied, ' She has 
every proper respect for the people of Red River, and this is shown 
in her having sent Commissioners to treat with them.' I told him 
I had seen the prisoners some time back, when they commissioned 
me to say to their friends at Portage that they desired peace, and I offered to 
go to them again and reason'with them should that be necessary. On this 
he said, ' Look here, Mr. Smith, Mr. Scott, the representative, went to see the 
prisoners at my desire, and on asking them whom they would vote for as 
councillors, if they were permitted a choice outside their own body, Thomas 
Scott came forward and said, 'My boys, have nothing to do with those 
Americans.' And when I remarked, 'This is really a most trifling affair 
and ought not to have been repeated,' he said, * Do not attempt to prejudice 
us against the Americans, for although we have not been with them, they are 
with us, and have been better friends to us than the Canadians.' Much more 
was said on both sides, but argument, entreaty, and protest alike failed to 
draw him from his purpose, and he closed by saying, ' I have done three 
good things since I have commenced : I have spared Boulton's Life at youi 
instance, and I do not regret it, for he's a fine fellow ; I pardoned Gaddy, 
and he showed his gratitude by escaping out of the Bastion, but I don't 
grudge him his miserable life ; and now I shall shoot Scott.' Lepine, the 
Adjutant-General — who was president of th« council of seven which tried Scott, 




THE HON. WILLIAM MULOCK, K.C., LL.D., M.P. 



LORD STRATHCOKA. 515 

five of whom, Kiel told me, ' with tears streaming from their eyes, condemned 
him as worthy of death,' a sentence which he had confirmed— now entered, 
and in answer to Kiel said, ' He must die.' Kiel then requested the Rev. P6re 
Lestanc to put the people on their knees for prayer, as it might do good to 
the condemned man's soul. Referring to P6re Lestanc, and making a final 
appeal, unnecessary here to repeat, I retired. It was now within a few 
minutes of one o'clock, and on entering the Governor's house, Rev. Mr. Young 
joined me and said, 'It is now considerably past the hour, I trust you have 
succeeded.' ' No,' I said, ' for God's sake go back at once to the poor man, 
for I fear the worst.' He left immediately, and a few minutes after he entered 
the room in which the prisoner was confined some guards marched in and 
told Scott his hour was come. Not until then did the reality of his position 
flash upon poor Scott. He said good-bye to the other prisoners, was led 
outside the gate of the fort with a white handkerchief covering his head ; his 
coffin, having a piece of white cotton thrown over it, was carried out. His 
eyes were then bandaged ; he continued ia prayer, in which he had been 
engaged on the way for a few minutes. He asked Mr. Young how he should 
place himself, whether standing or kneeling ; then knelt in the snow, said 
farewell, and immediately fell back, pierced by three bullets which had passed 
through his body. The firing party consisted of six men, all of whom, it is 
said, were more or less intoxicated. It has been further stated that only three 
of the muskets were loaded with ball cartridge, and that one man did not 
discharge his piece. Mr. Young turned aside when the first shots were fired, 
then went back to the l.ody, and again retired for a moment, while a man 
discharged his revolver at the suff'erer, the ball, it is said, entering the eye 
and passing round the head. 

" The wounded man groaned between the time of receiving the musket 
shots and the discharge of the revolver. Mr. Young asked to have the 
remains for interment in the burying-ground of the Presbyterian Church, but 
this was not acceded to, and a similar request, preferred by the Bishop of 
Rupert's Land, was also refused. He was buried within the walls of the fort 



516 BUILDERS OP CANADA. 

On descending the steps leading from the prison poor Scott, addressing Mr. 
Young, said, * This is a cold-blooded murder * ; then engaged in prayer, and 
was so occupied until he was shot. 

" After this date I held no communication whatsoever with Riel, except in 
reference to getting away from the country, which I was not allowed to leave 
without a pass. I felt that under the circumstances it was not desirable 
I should remain longer at Red River, but it was not until late on the night 
of the 18th inst., Riel gave permission for my departure. Although not 
accomplishing all that could have been desired, the mission to Red River, as 
I shall endeavour to show in a few words, had been productive of some good ; 
and that it was not entirely successful may fairly be attributed to the 
circumstances above referred to, in connection with the action taken and 
meetings held in January last. Success, although in a lesser degree, might 
also have been gained at a later period, but for the rising in February, which, 
though rash and productive ot results most unfortunate, I can hardly 
blame, knowing, as already stated, that those who took part in it were 
actuated and impelled by generous motives. 

"On reaching Red River in December last I found the English- 
speaking portion of the inhabitants greatly divided in opinion as to the 
comparative advantages of union with Canada and the formation of a Crown 
Colony, while a few, a very small number, favoured annexation to the United 
States. The explanations offered on the part of Canada they received as 
satisfactory, and with hardly a dissentient voice they would now vote for the 
immediate transfer to the Dominion. They earnestly requested me to assure 
His Excellency the Governor-General of their warm loyalty to the British 
Crown. 

"The case is difficult as regards the French half-breeds. A not 
inconsiderable number of them remained true to their allegiance during all 
the troubles through which they have had to pass, and with these will now be 
found associated many others whose minds had for a time been poisoned by 
gross misrepresentations made by designing men for their own selfish ends. 
A knowledge of the true state of the case, and of the advantages they would 
derive from union with Canada had been carefully kept from them, and they 



LOED STRATHCONA. 617 

were told to judge of Canadians generally by the acts and bearing of some 
of the less reflective immigrants, who had denounced them as * cumberers of 
the ground,' who must speedily make way for the * superior race ' about to 
pour in upon them. 

" It is also too true that in the unauthorized proceedings of some of the 
recent Canadian arrivals some plausible ground had been given for the feeling 
of jealousy and alarm with which the contemplated change of government 
was regarded by the native population. In various localities these 
adventurers have been industriously marking off for themselves considerable 
and in some ways very extensive and exceptionally valuable tracts of land, 
thereby impressing the minds of the people with the belief that the time had 
come when in their own country they were to be entirely supplanted by the 
stranger, a belief, however, which I have no doubt might have been 
completely precluded by the prevention of all such operations until Canada 
had fu ly unfolded her policy and shown the groundlessness of these 
fears. 

" Let us further bear in mind that many of the Catholic clergymen in 
the country are not French-Canadians, but Frenchmen, and consequently, it 
may be presumed, not very conversant with British laws and institutions and 
with the liberty and privileges enjoyed under them. Warmly attached to 
their flocks, they deemed it necessary to exact some guarantee that in their 
new political condition they would not be treated with injustice. It is 
unnecessary here to point out how the breach widened, until at length 
it attained a magnitude and significance little dreamt of in the commencement, 
even by those who joined most heartily in the movement. It is far more 
pleasing to be able to state, which I do with much confidence, that a large 
majority of the French party have no misgivings as to Union with Canada, 
and that joined by and under the guidance of his lordship. Bishop Tach6, and 
other members of the clergy -who enjoy their confidence, they will shortly 
prove themselves to be staunch supporters of the Dominion, firm in their 
allegiance to England. 



618 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

"In the course of the insurrection one deplorable crime and many 
grossly illegal acts have unquestionably been committed, but it would be 
alike unpolitic and unjust to charge them to the French population 
generally. 

" Much obloquy has been heaped on the Hudson's Bay Campany and 
their Governor and officers in the North-West, which I consider it 
unnecessary at this moment even to attempt to answer or refute, although 
not doubting that both could be readily and satisfactorily done. Errors, 
many and grave, have, it cannot be denied, been comrnitted on all sides, but 
wilful and intentional neglect of duty cannot, I feel convinced, be laid to 
the charge either of the Hudson's Bay Company or their representatives in 
the country. Personally I have been entirely unconnected with the 
administration of affairs in that department. 

" I would respectfully submit that it is of the utmost importance there 
should be a strong military force in the North- West as early as practicable. 
The minds of the Indians, especially the tribes in the Saskatchewan country, 
have been so perplexed and confused by the occurrences of the past six 
months that it would be very unsafe to trust to their forbearance ; and, 
indeed, until the question of Indian claims has been finally settled, it would 
not, in my opinion, be prudent to leave the country unprotected by military. 
The adjustment of those claims will require early attention, and some 
memoranda and evidence in my hands on the subject I shall, if desired, be 
prepared to lay before the Government." 

Time has shown how much Mr. Smith did to put down the rebellion. 
Quite as much, indeed, as the army that was sent into the West. The report 
given here shows with what wonderful skill he handled the turbulent 
elements in the North-West. From this time on his life was to be peculiarly 
identified with the west of Canada. In the interests of the Company and of 
Canada he returned to the great Lone Land at once, and at Fort Alexander 
met Colonel Wolseley with his brigade journeying towards Fort Garry. 
He accompanied the brigade to its destination and found the fort deserted 
iuid the rebel leaders in flight 



LORD STRATHCONA. 619 

Colonel Wolseley thereupon appointed Donald A. Smith to administei 
the affairs of the territory until the arrival of the new Lientenant-Governor, 
the Hon. Adams G. Archibald. 

Mr. Smith was now to enter upon his political career. He was elected 
for the Legislative Assembly of the Province of Manitoba for Winnipeg, 
December 30, 1870, and in March, 1871, was elected to the Dominion 
Parliament, for Selkirk. In 1874 he resigned his seat in the Manitoba 
House, but continued to sit for Selkirk until 1880. In 1871 he was 
appointed Chief Commissioner for the Hudson's Bay Company in the North- 
West, and better results were at once obtained by the Company. 

During his first session in the Dominion Parliament the matter of a 
transcontinental railway came up and Mr. Smith voted in favor of it. 
Although a comparatively silent member of Parliament, he was an important 
one, and when any matters relating to the great West came up all eyes were 
turned towards him. However, he did not fail to make enemies— among 
others, ex-Governor Macdougall and Dr. Schultz, In 1873 he was again a 
candidate in the West, this time as a supporter of Alexander Mackenzie. 

But the great work done by Mr. Smith for Canada was the building oi 
the Canadian Pacific Railway. He saw from the beginning of his life in the 
West the possibilities of such a line. He knew that there were no obstacles 
that could not be overcome, and he knew that in time, through such a 
railway, a vast population would move to the fertile plaina At first he 
believed that the work should be done by the government. He deplored the 
manner in which the Macdonald government had taken the initiative steps 
to build this line, and it was on the railway policy that he opposed them. 
They endeavored to win him to their side, but he beUeved that no 
government, on which a shadow of suspicion rested, should exist On 
account of the suspicion that rested on the Conservative goyernment he 
could not give it his support As a result of his action, bitter words pa«sed 
between him and Sir John Macdonald, but he kept a dignified attitude 
through it all, and before the end of his life Sir John was generous eaough to 
express approval of his course. 



520 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

Mr. Smith's great ambition was to see the Canadian Pacific Railway 
constructed at an early date, and he deplored the lack of enterprise that Mr. 
Mackenzie and his government were showing in the matter. He saw no hope 
of the North- West being built up under Liberal rule, and he once more cast 
in his lot with Sir John Macdonald. Mr. Smith had now changed his mind 
with regard to the construction of a railway and believed that it could only 
be properly done by a company, and so he was to be the •* prime mover and 
leading spirit in the Canadian Pacific Railway Company," and that the road 
was pushed across the plains and over the Rocky Mountains was largely due 
to his insight and financial daring. No other country in the world of such 
meagre and scattered population as the great Dominion, ever completed so 
vast an enterprise in so short a time ; and without Donald Smith there were 
many stages in its career when it would surely have come to grief. 

He had his reward for his enterprise from both the Hudson's Bay 
Company and the country. He was made Governor of the Company in 1886, 
and in the same year was created a Knight Commander of the Order of St 
Michael and St. George. His parliamentary career had continued without 
a break until 1880, and in 1887 he stood for Montreal West and was elected 
and continued to represent that constituency for nine years. 

His business ventures had been magnificently successful and he was very 
soon recognized as one of the wealthiest, if not the wealthiest man in Canada. 
But wealth in itself had no charms for him, and when the Canadian Pacific 
Railway was completed and his hands were to some extent freed, he began to 
look about him for the best way of doing good with the money he had 
amassed. In 1887 he and Lord Mount Stephen, at a cost of one million 
dollars, gave the Royal Victoria Hospital to Montreal. They did this for two 
reasons, one was that the great commercial centre of the Dominion should 
have a thoroughly up-to-date and well-equipped hospital, the other was that 
in their loyalty these two great Imperialists desired to do something not 
unworthy of Queen Victoria's Jubilee. The hospital is one of the finest in 
the world, and looks forth upon one of the most magnificent scenes in 
America. Indeed, " earth has not anything to show more fair " than the 



LORD STRATHCONA. 521 

scene from Mount Royal where it stands. Besides his generosity to 
Victoria Hospital he has done much to build up McGill Universi y, and has 
showered gift after gift upon that institution. 

When the West was in a state of turmoil over the Manitoba School 
question the public once more looked to Sir Donald Smith to help settle the 
difficulty in the region he now knew so well. He went to Winnipeg to 
endeavour to bring the contending parties to a reasonable attitude, and was 
finally appointed one of the Special Commissioners to look into the situation, 
and in the end when Sir Wilfrid Laurier settled the question he had as one 
of his supporters Sir Donald Smith. 

Sir Donald Smith's life had been a phenomenally successful one up to the 
present, and still greater honors were in store for him. He had come te 
Canada as a totally unknown Scotch lad, and had been appointed to the most 
desolate post in the domain of the great Hudson's Bay Company, and he had 
risen, through ability and close application, to the highest position in the gift 
of the Company, the Governorship. He was now to receive the highest 
honor in the gift of the Parliament of Canada. When Sir Charles Tupper 
resigned the High Commissionership to return to the political arena of the 
Dominion, Sir Donald Smith was sent to England in his place. As we have 
seen he had never been an active partisan, and had without hesitation 
deserted his party when he thought his country demanded such a course. 
He now went to London to act, to use his own words, " in the interests of the 
country as a whole and not of any party." When the Conservative party 
was defeated in 1896 he was wisely retained in office by the Liberals. At all 
times he has had the interest of Canada at heart, and by his vast wealth, 
clear insight and untiring zeal has done probably more than any other man 
to make Canada known to the people of the Motherland. In 1897 he was 
elevated to the peerage with the title of Baron Strathcona and Mount 
Royal. Although being heard but seldom in the House of Lords, he hag 
on several occasions spoken with force and acceptance. 

When the war in South Africa broke out he was to become something 
more than a Canadian figure. He now stood forth with imperial 
prominence. The reverses England sufiered in Cape Colony, Natal, and 



522 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

Orange Free State in the early stages of the war drew his attention to the 
needs of the English Army. Lord Strathcona grasped the situation. He 
saw, even before the War Office, that the great need in South Africa was an 
efficient body of scouts, and so he offered to equip and support at his 
own expense an ideal body of men for service in South Africa. He knew 
that the place to procure these troops was in the western and north-western 
parts of Canada with which he was thoroughly familiar. The offer was 
accepted by the War Office, and the Minister of Militia for the Dominion was 
given a free hand to raise this regiment. Strathcona's Horse went to South 
Africa magnificently equipped and bearing a banner with the motto of Lord 
Strathcona, " Perseverance " — the word that Bums up the reason of his 
success in life. 

This great Canadian statesman and Empire builder is now in his eighty- 
third year, but he is still an energetic worker on behalf of Canada, and is 
ever a true friend of his country and of the individual Canadians who visit 
him at the High Commissionei's office in Loudon. 




SIR WILLIAM C. VAN HORNE 



CHAPTER XXXnL 

THE RIGHT HON, SIB WILFRID LAURIEB. 

By Louis Honor^ Frechette. 

The Early Life of Wilfrid Laurier— His College Education— A Student of Law— For a Time a 
Journalist— Returns to the Study of Law— Enters the Quebec Legislative Assembly— 
A Brilliant Orator— Enters the House of Commons in 1874— Speaks in English with 
Great Power— Appointed Minister of Inland Revenue in the Mackenzie Government— 
The Defeat of the Mackenzie Government — Edward Blake Resigns the Leadership of 
Liberal Party— Laurier Chosen Leader— His Long Years in Opposition— Becomes Premier 
in 1896— His Cabinet— The Manitoba School Question— A New Tariff Introduced by 
the Liberal Party— Sir Wilfrid Laurier and the Queen's Diamond Jubilee— His Foreign 
Policy— Appointed a Knight Grand Cross of the Order of St Michael and St. George 
and a Member of the Imperial Privy Council — Honored in France — His Loyal Action 
During the South African War— A Prominent Figure at the King's Coronation— The 
Characteristics of His Oratory —A Thoroughly Loyal Britiih Subject— The Most Genial 
of Men. 

^T^HE present (1902) Prime Minister of the Canadian Dominion is a 
I gentleman who not only commands a considerable degree of prestige in 
his own country, but who has also acquired a high reputation abroad. 
His eloquence, his ability, his exquisite social qualities, and above all his 
unblemished personal character as a public man, have made him prominent 
among the statesmen of the day, and in many respects he ranks inferior to 
none of them. So his friends are proud to say, and so most of his political 
opponents — for he has no personal enemies — certainly think. Let me briefly 
trace the remarkable career of this gifted contemporary who, since the month 
of June, 1896, has played such an important part in the destinies of our 
country. 

Wilfrid Laurier was bom on the 20th of November, 1841, at St Lin, 
County of L'Assomption, in the Province of Quebec. His father was M. 
Carolus Laurier, a land surveyor by profession, a gentleman of limited 
means, but a most estimable citizen. H« took his course at th« nearest 

526 



626 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

College — that of L' Assomption. In 1860, we find him in Montreal on the 
benches of McGill, and poring over the Pandects and the Coutume de Paris in 
the law chambers of the late Rodolph Laflamme, who was afterwards hie 
colleague, as Minister of Justice in the Mackenzie Cabinet. Having been 
called to the Bar in 1864, he practised his profession for two years in 
partnership with the noted Mcd^ric Lanctot, that hot-headed and impetuous 
journalist and public speaker, who, at the time of the Confederation scheme, 
enjoyed a noisy popularity which was destined to change soon afterwards into 
a sad and undignified obscurity. The feverish restlessness of his surroundings 
at this time were by no means congenial to Laurier's calm and methodical 
temperament ; and this may have been one of the reasons which induced him 
to leave Montreal. In 18G7, the death of Eric Dorion had just occurred, and 
his Dcfricheur, that popular journal which so valiantly fought the battles of 
the Liberal party in the Eastern Townships, was also on the point of ending 
its career, when Lanctot's young partner started for L'Avenir, there to take 
up the pen which had fallen forever from the grasp of the unswerving 
Democrat who had hitherto wielded it with such effect. Soon enough, 
hoivcver, the new journalist felt that his talents demanded a different arena 
and he decided to again seek his fortune at the Bar. The Eastern Townships 
were then making rapid strides along the path of progress and prosperity, 
and the future statesman settled at St. Christophe — now Arthabaskaville — and 
it was not long before his reputation as a lawyer spread wide and far in the 
district. 

His marked oratorical powers, his business integrity and his pleasant 
and kindly disposition won him a universal popularity ; so much so, that ' in 
the Provincial elections of 1871 the united Counties of Drummond and 
Arthabaska returned him as their representative in the Quebec Legislative 
Assembly by an overwhelming majority. His debut before the House 
produced a sensation. Who could he be, this young politician not yet thirty 
years of age, who thus, in a maiden speech, handled the deepest public 
questions with such boldness and authority? Whence had this new orator 
come — so fluent, cultivated and charming — who awed even his adversaries 
into respect by language so polished, so elevated in tone, so strong and yet so 



THE RIGHT HON. SIR WILFRID LAURIER. 527 

moderate even in the heat of discussion ? On the following day, the name of 
Laurier was on every lip. From this initial point of his stirring career, the 
future Prime Minister proceeded by master-strokes. Thus, as the resounding 
triumph of his dehid in the Legislative Assembly of Quebec had placed him 
in the highest rank among the most brilliant French orators of his Province, 
that which marked his entry into the House of Commons, in 1874, carried 
him at one bound to the distinction of being one of the chief English-speaking 
debaters of the Dominion. The occasion was a solemn one, and never to be 
forgotten by any of those who were present. The subject before the House 
was the expulsion of Louis Riel, the rebel of the North-West, who, though 
under accusation for the murder of Thomas Scott and a fugitive from justice, 
had just been elected member for Provencher. The question was a burning 
one and the public mind was greatly inflamed over it. It required, in very 
truth, a master of eloquence to take the case in hand and to thread his way 
without falling or stumbling among the masses and mazes of prejudice which 
rose up all around the Metis chief. The debate, which was violent and 
heated, had been going on for two days when at last Laurier took 
the floor. 

He was known to be eloquent. He had already addressed the House in 
his own tongue at the opening of the Session. No one dreamed, however, 
that he would risk his reputation by attempting a speech in English under 
such hazardous and trying circumstances. Great as was the general surprise, 
the revelation was greater. In the belief of many who heard him that day, 
no orator — unless, indeed, it be himself — has since achieved a like success in 
any of our deliberative assemblies. As in the elegance and academic diction 
of which he is so thorough a master, the brilliant speaker entered calmly into 
the heart of his subject, a deep silence spread itself through the great 
Chamber and the English members listened in hushed amazement to this 
charmer who wielded their own language with such grace, and who dealt 
them such cruel home-truths in a tone they could not resist applauding. 
Astonished glances were exchanged on every side. Laurier kept his whole 
audience hanging upon his lips for more than an hour. Not for a single 
moment did his eloquence fail him. He expounded the doctrines and 



528 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

elucidated the principles of legal and constitutional right with the ease of a 
Parliamentary veteran and the precision of a practised dialectician. He 
grouped his facts so skilfully, adduced his proofs and authorities with 
such cumulative force, reared his arguments one upon the foundation of 
another with such close, quick, inexorable logic, that his conclusions seemed 
to flash out of their own accord, unforced but irresistible. 

Every part of his speech, moreover, was linked to the rest in admirably 
reasoned sequence, and the oration from beginning to end flowed freely, 
without hesitation, without a moment's groping for words, and, at the same 
time, with never one useless sentence, with never one superfluous syllable. 
No less perfect was the manner of his delivery : the resounding and vibrating 
voice, the wealth and variety of intonation, the chaste simplicity and 
appropriativeness of gesture and, finally, the attitude of the speaker, as full of 
natural self-command as it was of personal dignity. Everything contributed 
to evoke an indescribable enthusiasm. The outburst of applause which 
greeted the speaker as he resumed his seat continued for fully five minutes 
afterwards, while the Ministers of the Crown and all the prominent members 
flocked around him eager to offer their congratulations. It seemed as if 
everyone realized that a future Chieftain had just proclaimed himself and 
asserted his right to leadership by the Ego nominor leo that had rung through 
every sentence fallen from his lips. The cause was a lost one, of course, but 
Laurier had gained the day so far as he, personally, was concerned. From 
that moment a place in the Cabinet was virtually assigned to him ; and he 
was called upon to fill it as Minister of Inland Revenue in 1877, on the 
retirement of M. Cauchon, who had been appointed Lieutenant-Governor of 
Manitoba. 

Then occurred a singular mishap, which furnishes a striking example of 
the aberrations of the popular mind, as well as the often unaccountable 
vicissitudes of political life. The new Minister, although he had been 
returned at the previous election by a majority of more than seven hundred 
votes over an eloquent and distinguished member of the legal profession, 
found himself unable to secure his re-election, and was defeated by a worthy 
and inoffensive village tradesman, who distanced him by a majority of 



THE RIGHT HON. SIR WILFRID LAURIER. ^- ' 

twentj'-one votes. This was one of the repulses to the Mackenzie 
Government from which it never recovered. Laurier, indeed, returned to 
the Capital as the chosen representative of Quebec East, but it was in vain. 
The impulse had been given and the political see-saw had commenced to 
Bway. The young Minister's popularity in the Province at large was 
powerless to in any way check it. Nevertheless, the crushing defeat which 
was suffered by the Liberals in the following year did not in the least degree 
affect Laurier's personal influence, as may be inferred from the fact of his 
appointment a few years later to the position of Leader of the party for the 
whole Dominion. This was indeed a distinction which seemed, in earlier 
years, beyond the dreams of the most sanguine ambition. The fact that in 
the Dominion, as a whole, the population of British origin outnumbers the 
French in the proportion of three to one, had always led to the belief that it 
was impossible for a French-Canadian to attain the leadership of either of the 
political parties ; and this, not so much on account of the prejudices of English 
members of the House, as because of the natural unwillingness of the masses 
to follow a chief whose nationality and creed are not those of the majority. 
For a political party to select such a leader is a hazardous experiment. Not 
only does it demand the sacrifice of a most important element of success, but 
it is not unlikely to endanger the party cause itself. 

This consideration — generally paramount to all others in political 
matters — counted for nothing, however, against the future Premier, and in 
spite of the fact that the Liberal party included a large group of English 
members of unquestionable ability and prestige when Edward Blake was 
forced, in 1887, by considerations of health, to hand his marshal's baton to a 
lieutenant, Laurier was finally chosen to take his place at the head of the 
phalanx without a dissentient voice. And so firmly and ably did the young 
leader keep his footing on the treacherous ground he had to tread, that the 
choice of the party was more than justified all through the long and 
bitter strife which followed until the final victory was achieved. After nine 
years of Opposition, leadership and struggle, he at last won the day, and in 
the month of June, 1896, at tlie general elections, the Liberal party was 

returned with a majority of thirty, and Wilfrid Laurier waa sworn into office 

28 



532 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

as President of the Privy Council on the 9th of July. On the 13tli of the 
same month he completed his task of forming an Administration as 
follows : 

Prime Minister and President of the 

Queen's Privy Council The Hon. Wilfrid Lanrier 

Minister of Trade and Commerce Sir Richard J. Cartwriy lit 

Secretary of State Hon. Richard William Scott ^ 

Minister of Justice Sir Oliver Mowat 

Minister of Marine and Fisheries Sir Louis Henry Davies 

Minister of Militia and Defence Hon. Frederick William Bordea 

Postmaster-General Hon. William Mulock 

Minister of Agriculture Hon. Sydney Arthur Fisher 

Minister of Public Works Hon. Joseph Israel Tarte 

Without Portfolio Hon. Richard Reid Dobell 

Minister of Finance Hon. William Stevens Fielding 

Minister of Railways and Canals Hon. Andrew George Blair 

Without Portfolio Hon. Christophe Alphonse Geoffrion 

Minister of the Interior Hon. Clifford Sifton 

Minister of Customs Hon. William Paterson 

Minister of Inland Revenue Sir Henri Joly de L,otbini Jre 

In fulfilment of his promise, while in Opposition, Laurier at once gave 
his attention to the Manitoba School question and was appointed one of the 
Committee of Council to conduct negotiations with several delegates from 
the Manitoba Government who were sent to Ottawa to determine on a 
basis of settlement. The Report of the delegates and the subsequent 
action taken thereon by the Provincial Government and Legislature are 
matters of history. The question seems now to have been finally removed 
from the domain of Canadian politics. The Premier met Parliament in 
August, and, after obtaining from it the necessary supplies for the fiscal year, 
brought the Session to a close. On meeting Parliament again, March . 25, 
1897, the Minister of Finance, Mr. Fielding, submitted a new fiscal policy for 
the Dominion, the most prominent feature in which was that according 
preferential trade relations with Great Britain. The new tariff met with 
little opposition from Parliament, and was favorably received by the people 
ftt large. In the month of June the new Premier left for England, on the 
Invitation of Her Majesty's Government, to take part with the Prime 
Ministers of the other parts of the Empire in the celebration of the Queen's 
Diamond Jubilee. This was a circumstance which might have been a most 



1SE BIGHT HON. SIB WILFBID LAUBIEB. 533 

dangerous one for any man endowed with less keenness and general versatility 
of talent than Wilfrid Laurier. His reputation, which had preceded him 
abroad ; his position as official representative of the most important CJolony of 
the Empire ; and above all the fact of his being a French-Canadian by blood 
and education, naturally made him the centre of attentions, exceedingly 
difficult to face calmly — especially by one who had crossed the Atlantic for 
the first time in his life. But the test was a successful one. Not only was 
he equal to the task, but all his public utterances, all his political moves, all 
his appearances before the curtain, increased his popularity and contributed 
to make him the lion of the day. 

In his first speech on landing in England, Sir Wilfrid predicted that 
the time was approaching "when Canadian pride and aspiration would 
develop a claim to demand, as a right, their share in that broader citizenship 
which embraces the whole Empire, and whose Legislative centre is the Palace 
of Westminster." While on British soil Sir Wilfrid did not lose sight of the 
practical and material interests of Canada. He succeeded in having the 
commercial treaties between Great Britain and Germany and Belgium 
denounced, with a view to freeing Canada from the restraint which prevented 
her from granting to Great Britain trade favours denied to the treaty powers ; 
and for this new departure in Imperial policy, with " the marvellous goal to 
which it leads," the London Times declared that " Laurier's name must live 
in the annals of the British Empire." As a natural consequence of all this, 
the most distinguished honors were lavished upon the Canadian statesman : he 
was made a member of the Imperial Privy Council and appointed a Knight 
Grand Cross of the Order of St. Michael and St. George. The Universities of 
Oxford and Cambridge conferred honourary degrees upon him, while the 
Cobden Club admitted him to honourary membership and awarded him its 
gold medal, " in recognition of his exceptional and distinguished services to 
the cause of international and free exchange." 

Proceeding to France, he visited President Faure at Havre and was 
appointed by him a Grand Offic* . of the Legion of Honour. At last, after 
three months of absence which could only be compared to a triumphal march 



534 BUILDERS OF CANADA. 

from the first to the last day, he returned home to be tlie recipient, with Lady 
Laurier, of an ovation as general and enthusiastic as ever a royal victor could 
expect at the hands of fanatically devoted subjects. 

He made Imperial pretensions* while in England and was soon to be 
called upon to prove that his utterances then were not mere idle words. In 
1898 war broke out in South Africa and he was found loyal to the Empire, 
and with his sanction and approval the first body of troops ever sent abroad 
by the Canadian parliament to fight in England's wars journeyed to far 
Africa to do valorous deeds on kopje and veldt. 

Once more, in the present year (1902), he journeyed to England to take 
part in the coronation of King Edward VIL, and by his powerful addresses 
on Imperial affairs, again proved himself the ablest of Canadian orators and 
statesmen, and showed the motherland that Canada had within her borders 
brilliant parliamentarians, as able as the leaders in the British House of 
Commons to deal with questions affecting the interests of the Empire. 

After his return from the Diamond Jubilee the Premier received from 
the Toronto University and from the Queen's University, Kingston, the 
honourary degree of LL. D. He was also elected an honourary life member 
of the National Liberal Club, London, England. While in Opposition Sir 
Wilfrid Laurier is stated to have been engaged during some years in writing 
a History of Canada, from the Union of 1841, but this has not yet been 
published. A collection of his principal speeches appeared under the 
editorship of M. Ulric Barthe in 1890. In his younger days he served in the 
volunteers, having been Ensign in the Arthabaskaville Infantry Company 
from 1869 to 1878. He was married on May 13, 1868, to Miss Lafontairie, of 
Montreal. 

As a Parliamentary leader the Canadian Premier has been eminently 
successful. Thoroughly equipped with information on many subjects; 
endowed with a presence of mind which makes him always ready at repartee 
and seldom permits him to be caught off his guard ; displaying prudence at 
every step, leaving nothing to chance, charming his friends by his 
self-confidence and boldness; he disarms his opponents by his courteous 

* See Appendix 



THE RIGHT HON. SIR WILFRID LAURIER. 637 

fairness no less than lie confounds them by his suJ.,len and brilliant attacks. 
He is seldom [^^Liilty of a false move, and rarely permits himself to be taken 
by surprise. And, although he may not inflict a crushing defeat upon the 
enemy at every encounter, nobody can boast of ever having seen him driven 
from the field. It is, however, on occasions when some vital question has to 
be disposed of, when the supreme and critical blow which is to decide the 
fate of a campaign must be dealt, that Laurier rises to the full height of his 
political stature, and is able to spread the wings of his mind to their fullest 
stretch. As an orator, Sir Wilfrid Laurier does not indulge in rounded 
periods and striking metaphors which aim solely at literary effect. He does 
not labour to find witty phrases and sonorous sentences ; nor does he appeal 
often to the sentiments or passions of his audience. He deals mainly in good 
sense, fairness and logic. The truth is enough for him ; the truth in all its 
beauty and purity, couched in language that is accurate, scholarly, copious, 
and as melodious as language can be, yet full of virile energy, which one 
divines rather than feels, under the nervous pungency of an elocution which 
gushes out as limpid as the water from a rocky spring. You cannot listen to 
him for five minutes without saying to yourself : " An honest man is 
speaking" — Vir bonus dicendi peritus. Alluding to his talent as a public 
speaker, the London Daily Mail compared him with some of the foremost 
British statesmen, and expressed a wish that it were possible to place him side 
by side with them in the Imperial Parliament. 

While Laurier is not by any means an idealist in the narrow sense of 
the word, he may be said to be under the domination of one germinal and 
originative idea, which I regard as the synthesis, so to speak, of an intellect 
as diversified in its qualities as it is free from confusion and complexity. 
This dominating idea may be summed up in the phrase "Liberalism in the 
service of patriotism.'' An advanced patriotism and a temperate Liberalism. 
By an advancea patriotism must be understood one which is broad and 
enlightened and dares to look the future in the face ; while temperate 
Liberalism means that kind of Liberalism which has shaken off all the 
hyperbolism and Utopian dreams in which its so-called principles are so often 
wrapped in some of the countries of Europe. Yea, Sir Wilfrid Laurier u an 



538 BUILDERS OP CANADA. 

enlightened patriot ; that is a patriot of his own day and of his own country. 
There does not, I believe, exist a truer Canadian. Canada — not the Province 
of Quebec alone — ^is his fatherland. It is upon Canada as a whole that his 
thoughts and hopes are constantly centered. He loves his own race and is 
proud of it : but he strives to develop, both in himself and others, all that is 
broad and lofty in that sentiment, and to discourage any elements of 
narrowness and exclusiveness which it may contain. 

As to his Liberalism, the formula of it he has borrowed, in toto, from the 
chosen high-priests of English democracy, and its spirit and essence he 
recognizes to be in the British Constitution — that Constitution, which is, to 
adopt his own expression, elastic enough to admit all new ideas, yet solid 
enough to serve as a bridge between the institutions of the past and the 
aspirations of the future. Physically Sir Wilfrid Laurier is distinction itself, 
and would attract notice in the most aristocratic gathering. He is tall, slight 
and elegant in figure ; while he commands respectful admiration by the 
dignity of his carriage as well as by a certain unaffected, and probably 
unconscious grace which is the ruling characteristic of his whole personality. 
His whole countenance denotes peace in himself and good will to others. In 
his social relations Laurier suffers no loss of the prestige that distinguishes 
him in other spheres. His affability and hospitality under his own roof, the 
charm of his manner and conversation as a guest, his generous open- 
handedness and open-heartedness on all occasions and to all men, would have 
been sufficient to earn him a reputation in society, had his work as a 
statesman left room for a rival distinction. He possesses in addition the 
loftiest characteristic of strong natures and of those whose merits have been 
established by fame, that of never making anyone feel too conscious of his 
superiority. All are at ease with him. A great man in public ; an amiable 
cavalier among the fair sex ; a genial companion among his intimate friends ; 
his lips ever ready with a laugh as trank and hearty as his words; such is 
Sir Wilfrid Laurier. 



APPENDIX. 

Reply to thk Toast, "Our Guests, thb Colonial Premiers," by Sir 
Wilfrid Laurier, Premier op Canada, at a Banquet Given by 
THE Imperial Institute to the Colonial Premiers, London, June 
18, 1897. The Prince of Wales, Now King Edward VII, Pre- 
sided AND Introduced Sir Wilfrid. 

Your Royal Highness, My Lords and Gentlemen : — The toast which 
your Royal Highness has just proposed in such graceful terms is one which 
is important at all times and opens a subject which at the present time 
perhaps more than at any other engrosses and absorbs the minds of all 
thinking men. During the few days in which my colleagues and myself 
have had the privilege to be in England we have had hourly evidences that 
the Colonies at the present moment occupied no small part in the affections 
of the people of England. Sir, Colonies were born to become nations. In my 
own country, and perhaps also in England, it has been observed that Canada 
has a population which in some instances exceeds, in many others rivals 
the population of independent nations, and it has been said that perhaps the 
time might come when Canada might become a nation of itself. My answer 
is this simply : Canada is a nation. Canada is free, and freedom is 
its nationality. Although Canada acknowledges the suzerainty of a Sovereign 
Power, I am here to say that independence can give us no more rights than 
we have at present. 

Lord Lansdowne has spoken of a day when perhaps our Empire might be 
in danger. England has proved at all times that she can fight her own 
battles, but if a day were ever to come when England was in danger, let the 
bugle sound, let the fires be lit on the hills, and in all parts of the Colonies, 
though we might not be able to do much, whatever we can do shall be done 
by the Colonies to help her. From all pans of this country since I have 
been here, both in conversation and in letters, I have been asked if the 
sentiments of the French population of Canada were characterized by 
absolute loyalty towards the British Empire. I have been reminded that 

533 



540 BUILDERS OF CANADA: 

feuds of race are long and hard to die, and that the feuds of France — the 
land of my ancestors — with England have lasted during many generations. 
Let me say et once that though it be true that the wars of France and 
England have their place in history, it was the privilege of the men of our 
generation to see the banners of France and England entwined together 
victoriously on the banks of the Alma, on the heights of Inkerman, and on 
the walls of Sebastopol. 

It is true that during the last century and the century before, a long 
war, a long duel, I might call it, was waged between England and France for 
the possession of North America, but in the last battle that took place on the 
Plains of Abraham, both generals, the one who won and the one who failed, 
fell. If you go to the city of Quebec you will see a monument erected in 
commemoration of that battle. What is the character of that monument ? 
Monuments to record victories are not scarce in England or in France ; but 
such a monument as this which is in Quebec, I do not think you will find in 
any other part of the world, hr it is a monument not only to him who won, 
but also to him who failed. It is a monument dedicated to the memory of 
Wolfe and Montcalm, and the dedication, which is one of the noblest and best 
of the kind, not only for the sentiments which it records but also as a literary 
expression, is as follows: 

" Mortem vidus communem famam historia monumentum posteritas dedit" 
Here is a monument to the two races equal in fame, courage, and glory, and 
that equality exists at the present time in Canada. In this you have the 
sentiments of my countrymen — we are equal to-day with those who won on 
the battle-field on the Plains of Abraham. It is by such acts that Englaind 
has won the hearts of my fellow-countrymen ; it is by such acts that she can 
ever claim our loyalty. 

Your Royal Highness, let me now thank you from the bottom of my 
heart for the kind words you have just spoken. Your Royal Highness has 
been kind enough to remind us that at one time in its earlier day you visited 
Canada. Many changes have taken place since that time, but let me assure 
your Royal Highness there has been no change in the loyalty of the people 
of Canada. 



A Review of Popular Progress 

IN a country where the traditions of the people have been chieHy 
those of other and older lands ; where the history, until within a 

few generations of time, has been one of internal conflict between 
rival races and foreign flags ; where the modern events of develop- 
ment in a constitutional direction and in material welfare have been 
controlled by the slowly-merging antagonisms of race and religion ; 
the growth of liberty and the matured practice of self-government 
have naturally aff'orded room for interesting and stirring experiences. 
Add to these considerations vast and almost unknown areas, immense 
difficulties of transportation and trade, the competition of a great 
southern neighbour of not always friendly tendencies, the continued 
arrival throughout half a century of hundreds of thousands of people 
with diverse tastes and politics and various degrees of knowledge or 
ignorance, and the position grows in interest and importance. 

With the nineteenth century commenced the constitutional his- 
tory of Canada. To the British subject and elector of the end of that 
century it is difficult to clearly comprehend the situation in those 
olden days. Newspapers were so few as to be of little influence. 
Books were scarce, valuable, and of a character not calculated to 
throw light upon existing problems. The people of Lower Canada 
were wrapped up in the traditions and surroundings of many years 
before and, under the British flag, were fondly nursing the ideas and 
ideals of Old France in the days of Louis XIV. ; of New France in 
the days of Montcalm and the earlier period and glories of Frontenac. 

The people of the English Provinces were still little more than 
22 541 



542 A REVIEW OF POPULAR PROGRESS 

isolated pioneer settlers steeped in the shadowed memories of a past 
struggle for King and institutions and country ; embittered against 
all republican or democratic tendencies ; prejudiced, naturally and 
inevitably, against the Radicals of England who had helped to ruin 
the Royal cause in the Thirteen Colonies and against the French of 
Quebec who had been so long the traditional enemies of England 
and the sincere foes of British supremacy in North America. To 
them, all new-comers, whether the later Loyalists from the States, or 
immigrants of subsequent years from the Old Land, were subjects of 
suspicion as being possibly alien in origin, or indifferent in sentiment 
to their own sacrifices and their own sacred political beliefs. To the 
French-Canadians, all immigrants were equally undesirable as being 
practically certain to possess religious and racial differentiation from 
themselves. 

THE EVOLUTION OF CANADIAN PARTIES 

Into this peculiar mass of varied interests and antagonistic feel- 
ings came the leaven of a constitutional and Parliamentary system. It 
did not develop from within. It was not the result of popular evolu- 
tion or even of popular desire. The French-Canadians accepted it 
as an external part of their new situation, a political appanage to the 
Conquest ; while the Loyalists of the other Provinces did not really 
want it and would probably have been quite satisfied for many years 
to come with able Governors and reasonably efficient local advisers. 
Still, the latter knew how to use it when received and were more or 
less familiar with the underlying principles of a Legislature and free 
government. When, however, increasing population brought varied 
political sentiments and personalities into conflict with the Loyalists, 
the inevitable result followed and a dominant class found itself in 
collision with a dominating people who cared more for the present 
than the past, more for phantasms of liberty than memories of loyalty, 
more for a share in the government of the country than for abstract 



A REVIEW OF POPULAR PROGRESS 543 

justice to the men who had in great measure made the country. In 
Lower Canada, as elsewhere pointed out, the Legislature soon became 
merely a weapon of offence against everything British ; and the exter- 
nal institution foisted upon a people who understood autocracy better 
than the simplest principle of freedom and who had not even practiced 
the most rudimentary elements of municipal self-government was 
adapted to the exigencies of racial feeling with a facility which reflects 
credit upon French-Canadian quickness of perception while fully illus- 
trating the racial prejudices of the people. Out of these conditions 
came the Rebellion of 1837, the troubles of 1849, and the struggles 
of the "Sixties." 

At the beginning of the century Toryism was dominant ; at the 
end of the century democracy governs. Which was the better? 
The average writer will unhesitatingly say that the rule of the people, 
by the people, is the accredited dictum of his age and the only just 
principle of government. But the admission of the fact that popular 
rule is wise and right in 1900 does not interfere with a perception 
that, under vastly different conditions, other forms and systems in 
1800 may also have been wise and proper for the time being. The 
government by a class in the English Provinces and in days when 
that class represented the loyal and pioneer population of the country, 
and ruled it in accordance with the hereditary sentiments of the major- 
ity was not in itself unjust in practice or despotic in principle. The 
resistance of that class to innovation and democracy was natural and 
probably wise at a time when these things meant American ideas and 
the dangers of American propaganda in a small and weak community. 
The rule of a few leading families of experience and knowledge in 
days of scattered settlers and isolated homes and general poverty was 
in itself a benefit. In Lower Canada the English settlers were the 
only class trained in the self-government which had been meted out 
in a measure as large as was thought to be safe and wise and which 



544 A REVIEW OF POPULAR PROGRESS 

was really too large for the occasion. They were the only element, 
outside of a few Seigneurs, who were in any way fitted for adminis- 
tration and justice and the making of impartial laws — as the subse- 
quent adventures of the French Assembly clearly prove. 

Moreover, if this class Government of 1800 was a selfish one in 
some respects it was not any more so than a partisan Government in 
1900 would be. If it chose associates from, and filled appointments 
with, its relatives and friends, the sin was no greater than that of any 
Canadian Government of a hundred years later. If it fought strenu- 
ously and sincerely, in all the Provinces, for British institutions as then 
understood and for the British connection which it regarded as a child 
does its mother, who is there in 1900 that can throw stones at it? 
Faults and flounderings there were in the Toryism of 1800, but if we 
measure it in accordance with its pioneer surroundings and limited 
resources we must conclude that those results were no more serious in 
bulk or consequences than are the faults and flounderings of the democ- 
racy of 1900. And, between the two, lie a hundred years of struggle 
and evolution, of growing wealth and increased popular intelligence. 

CANADIAN POLITICAL LEADERS 

The leaders of the century, the rulers of the people, have, how- 
ever, greatly changed in character and scope of culture as the coun- 
try has slowly broadened out from Colonies into Provinces, from 
Provinces into a Dominion, from a Dominion into a British nation. 
The early leaders of the Canadas such as William Smith, Jonathan 
Sewell, John Beverley Robinson and Isaac Allen were steeped to the 
lips in memories of the Thirteen Colonies and the Revolution. 
Later Tory leaders such as Bishop Strachan, Sir Allan N. McNab, 
William Henry Draper, Henry Sherwood and William Cayley were 
equally instinct with the traditions of English public life as found in 
the pages of history and the knowledge of Canadian adherents. 
Many of these men were cultured gentlemen in the best English sense 




THE RT. HON. SIR WILFRID I.AURIER 



A REVIEW OF POPULAR PROGRESS 547 

of the word, as were also Robert Baldwin, Francis Hincks and such 
French-Canadians as Sir L. H. Lafontaine, Sir A. A. Dorion and Sir 
E. P. Tache. They strove to imitate English manners and customs 
as far as possible and many leaders of French extraction added a 
most useful element of courtesy and grace to the politics and social 
life of the young and struggling community. On the other hand 
many of the French-Canadian leaders of the first half of the century 
were steeped in the traditions of French life, the affiliations of French 
literature and the elements of French thought. They followed the 
democracy of republican France — with a dash of republican America 
as one of the constituents of theory and policy. Canada as a national 
entity was, of course, not in existence and the culture of the mixed com- 
munity was, therefore, either French or English, with a strong addi- 
tional independent element — -as the years advanced toward the begin- 
ning of the second half of the century— of something that was purely 
American in style and type. 

In the year igoo it is almost a question which of all these ele- 
ments is uppermost in the peculiar condition of affairs embodied in 
the name Canadian. There is a strong and pronounced Canadian 
sentiment amongst the people which has largely overcome and 
destroyed, in their politicians and leaders, the extraneous tendencies 
of opinion known as French, or English, or American. At the same 
time the bulk of the population is British in its loyalty and increas- 
ingly Imperialistic in opinion — a sentiment grading upwards from the 
passiveness of Quebec to the enthusiasm of Toronto, or Victoria, or 
Halifax. The culture of the community has become, nominally, a 
local culture. It chiefly emanates from local Universities and in poli- 
tics is made to fit local feelings. But the general tendency has been 
to make this culture American in style and character. Canadian Uni- 
versities are largely affected by American influences, as is the whole 
educational system of the country. The press is American in type 



548 A REVIEW OF POPULAR PROGRESS 

and utterly opposed in principles of management to the English 
model. The politics of the Dominion are run upon lines about half- 
way between the antagonistic systems of Great Britain and the Uni- 
ted States. The speech, manner and style of its public men are 
essentially American and the social character of the community more 
nearly approximates to that type than to any other. 

Canadian leaders of the last half of the century have been very 
different in type from their fellow-leaders at the heart of the Empire. 
Few of them have even had the culture of old-time gentlemen such as 
Robinson or Sewell. None of them have shown the varied accom- 
plishments now so common amongst the statesmen of Great Britain 
where a Salisbury is devoted to science, a Rosebery has written one 
of the most eloquent little books of the century, a Balfour has won 
fame as a philosophic writer and a Gladstone has distinguished him- 
self in almost innumerable fields of attainment. Lack of time and 
the fact of having to make a living when out of office, together with 
the receipt of small salaries when in ofifice, are the real reasons for 
this condition of affairs. In England it is an every-day matter for 
some leading public man to speak at length, and with evident learn- 
ing, upon questions of literature, art, sociology, philosophy, and the 
progress, or otherwise, of all the varied elements of a complex civili- 
zation. As yet Canada has not approached this level though signs 
have not been wanting toward the end of the century that the 
Dominion is slowly growing upwards in culture as in other matters. 
And, even now, it is greatly superior in the style of its public men to 
the position of Australasian leaders. 

In other respects Canadian leaders differ from those of earlier 
years. With all their wider outlook and the Imperial position which 
the Dominion has latterly attained they still remain somewhat narrow 
in conception while the necessity of conciliating rival races and reli- 
gions has developed an extreme opportunism. The latter quality has 



A REVIEW OF POPULAR PROGRESS 



549 



come to them in part from over the American border ; in part from 
the peculiar nature of the mixed Canadian democracy ; in part from 
the brilliant example in details and methods, though not really in 
principles, of Sir John A. Macdonald. The British practice of hold- 
ing certain political convictions, in office or out of it, and of willingly 
surrendering power if anything happens to change those convictions, 
has not prevailed in Canada to anything like a general extent since 
the days of responsible government. Sir John Macdonald, it is true, 
had certain defined and prominent principles — British connection, pro- 
tection, opposition to American union of any kind— but outside of 
these he was quite willing to modify his opinions in order to forward 
the Interests of his party. It was not so in the earlier days of Canada; 
it is not so in the later days of England where a Hartington, or 
Bright, or Chamberlain, has sacrificed his party feelings and associa- 
tions and apparent future in order to oppose the new and dangerous 
proposals of a great popular leader such as Gladstone. 

Still, the politics of Canada, with all their admitted elements of 
weakness do not, at the end of the century, merit pessimistic consid- 
eration. Sir John Macdonald may have been an opportunist in minor 
matters, but it Is more than probable that Canada would not be a 
national unit and a power in the Empire to-day If he had not combined 
opportunism with the higher methods of statesmanship. Sir John 
Thompson, during his nine years of Dominion public life, gave the 
country a career of sterling honesty and won a reputation for political 
integrity which deserves the appreciation of posterity as it certainly 
conferred credit upon the Dominion of his too-brief day. Sir Leo- 
nard Tilley combined undoubted personal honour with rare qualities 
of speech and manner and heart. 

Sir Oliver Mowat, during his almost quarter of a century of 
Premiership In the Province of Ontario, displayed qualities of tact 
and conciliation which rose to the level of statesmanship. Sir 



550 A REVIEW OF POPULAR PROGRESS 

Adolphe Chapleau, during his long career in the politics of Quebec 
and Canada, developed a character that was curiously compounded of 
political selfishness and indifference to some of the higher principles 
of public life, with an eloquence which was so great as to stamp him 
a born leader of men. Sir Charles Tupper has contributed to Canadian 
history an element of force, a character of determination, and a career 
of consistent political labour which marks him out as a man worthy 
of high place in any country's Valhalla of eminence. The Hon. 
George Eulas Foster has given to the later years of Dominion politics 
an eloquence of speech and debate which it is difficult to find the 
equal of in Canadian history — unless it be the case of Joseph Howe. 
Sir Wilfrid Laurier, the first Liberal Premier of Canada since the 
days of Mackenzie, is an undoubted opportunist in politics, but he is 
also one of the most picturesque figures in the public life of the 
Empire. Handsome, eloquent in French and English, graceful in 
manner and bearing, cultured in language and attainment, he is a man 
of whose personality the country has reason to be proud. Sir Richard 
Cartwright is of a very different type, and one of the very few Cana- 
dian politicians whose oratory approximates to the English style and 
whose references and similies indicate wide knowledge and reading. 

Upon the whole it is apparent that, while Canadian politics are 
on a lower level than those in England, they are upon a much higher 
plane than in the United States or Australia. It is also clear that, 
while political leaders have changed greatly from the type of rulers 
living in the beginning of the century and have not yet developed 
the culture of older lands and wider opportunities, they have managed 
to more than hold their own upon this continent and are now, at 
the end of the century, rapidly developing along lines of politcal 
action which must, more and more, bring them into touch with the 
world-wide interests, politics and rule of the Mother-land. This will 
probably produce a higher form of political life and individual culture 



A REVIEW OF POPULAR PROGRESS 551 

in the future, though its attainment must be preceded by the creation 
of a more truly Canadian press and the estabHshment of a news system 
which does not leave the daily intellectual food of the Canadian peo- 
ple in American hands, or British and Imperial public affairs to be 
dealt with from a naturally alien and unsympathetic point of view. 

DEVELOPMENT OF EDUCATION 

During the century which constitutes the developing period of' 
Canadian history, as distinct from its picturesque and military periods, 
education has gone through various stages of growth. In Quebec it 
was at first essentially a religious and ecclesiastical system, controlled 
by priests and nuns and institutions under the leadership of the 
Church. Much of it was of the higher, or collegiate, type and 
intended primarily for the training of religious teachers. The attempts 
at establishing a general school system prior to the Rebellion, in 
1837, were tentative and feeble, even amongst the small English 
population ; and such schools as were in existence met with disaster 
in the times of trouble immediately preceding and succeeding the 
insurrection. The teachers of the day were needy and illiterate, the 
supervision careless and dishonest, the school-houses dirty and, in 
winter, very cold, the children unprovided with books, and the parents 
singularly indifferent* After the union with Upper Canada legisla- 
tion of various kinds and degrees of value followed and, between 
1853 and 1861, the pupils in Lower Canadian educational institutions 
of all kinds increased from 108,000 to 180,000 and the assessments 
and fees for their support rose from $165,000 to $526,000. 

Meanwhile, the Roman Catholic religious bodies of the Province 
had increased greatly in educational strength and efficiency — especi- 
ally the higher institutions of instruction. They possessed at least 
2,000,000 acres of land, some of it in the heart of Montreal and 
other growing centres, which developed wealth by every year's growth 

* Arthur Buller. Report upon Education in the Province of Quebec. i8j8. 
29 



552 A REVIEW OF POPULAR PROGRESS 

of the country. Colleges for this kind of teaching were founded 
at Quebec, Montreal, L'Assomption, Joliette, Levis, Nicolet, Rigaud, 
Rimouski, Ste. Anne, St. Hyacinthe, St. Laurent, Rouville, Terre- 
bonne, and other places. In 1854 Laval University was inaugurated 
at Quebec and later on was also established in Montreal. From its 
scholastic halls have come most of the rulers and leaders of French 
Canada since that time. Three years later Normal Schools were 
established for the training of teachers and in 1854 a Council of Public 
Instruction was organized with eleven Catholics and four Protest- 
ants in its membership. Out of this development came a common, 
or public school system which slowly improved until, in 1875 — eight 
years after Confederation when education had been placed in the 
hands of the Provincial Governments — legislation initiated by M, de 
Boucherville, along the lines which had been slowly evolved by Dr. 
Jean Baptiste Meilleur and the Hon. P. J. O. Chauveau in two prer 
ceding decades, established the existing system. 

At the end of the century this system is notable as having 
been created in a Province dominated by one race and religion and 
yet conceived and practiced in almost perfect fairness toward the 
minority. The Superintendent of Public Instruction has usually held 
office for many years in succession and has been fairly independent of 
political parties. The Catholic and Protestant elements of the popu- 
lation have separate Sections of the Council of Public Instruction 
and they administer the funds provided so as to suit the different 
ideas and ideals of their people. The Province boasts of seventeen 
colleges founded and maintained by the Roman Catholic clergy. It 
has McGill University as the centre of its English-speaking education 
during fifty years — much of the time under the administration and man- 
agement of the late Sir William Dawson — and now developed into one 
of the great Universities of the British Empire. The standard of super- 
ior education in the Province is hieh ; the standard of education in its 



A REVIEW OF POPULAR PROGRESS 553 

more preliminary forms is improving ; the teaching Orders of women 
who instruct pupils, numbering, in 1896. over 37,000, m domestic econ- 
omy as well as in ordinary accomplishments, are doing most useful 
work ; the number of children attending schools of all kmds has 
increased from 212,000 in 1867 to 307,000 in 1897- 

In the other Provinces there has been no racial division amongst 
'the people, but there were, at first, the inevitable difficulties of 
pioneer life, poverty of resource and distances in space. Isolation 
and lack of money produced paucity of schools everywhere and poor- 
ness of teaching wherever they did exist. Dr. John Strachan Bishop 
and politician and polemist, was practically the pioneer of educa- 
tion in Upper Canada. Out of his school at Cornwell came the 
leading men of the early days and from his conception of sectarian, 
or Church of England education, came greater institutions of learn- 
in. in Toronto-the Upper Canada College, Kings College^which 
wrs afterwards secularized as the University of Toronto, and Trinity 
College, which he then established as an educational centre for his 

cherished Church. ,,,»,;„ 

Contemporary with him in part, and living and working after him 
was Dr. Egerton Ryerson, the modern organizer of the pub he school 
system of Ontario, the vigorous and devoted champion o popular 
education and common schools. At first, in Upper Canada and down by 
the Atlantic, as in Quebec, instruction in its simpler forms was greatly 
neglected. Long after the people had passed out of their pioneer posi- 
tion and the excuse of poor roads or no roads, and of poverty, or lack of 
' public organization, was removed from valid consideration, they seemed 
to remain indifferent, in all the English Provinces, to the education of 
children and to be much more inclined to lavish money and attention 
upon Colleges and higher branches of learning. The log school- 
house of early days, the painfully inadequate accommodation for 
the pupils, the ignorant and sometimes intemperate teachers, remained 



554 A REVIEW OF POPULAR PROGRESS 

public evils, in at least the two latter particulars, well up to the end of 
the first half of the century. Gradually and eventually, a change for the 
better took place. Dr. Ryerson worked wonders in Upper Canada. 
His School Act of 1850, followed by the establishment of Separate 
Catholic Schools in 1862, laid the foundation of the existing system . 
which the sweeping legislation of 1871 altered greatly in detail with- 
out affecting seriously in principle. [ 

In 1876 the important change was made of placing the Education 
Department in charge of a responsible member of the Provincial 
Government and, between that time and 1883, it was under the control 
of the Hon. Adam Crooks. His successor was the Hon. George W. 
Ross who held the position until his accession to the Premiership of 
the Province in 1899. Progress from the middle of the century 
onwards had been very marked. Between 1850 and 1871 the teachers 
in the public schools increased by 2,000 in number and the attendance 
of pupils by 100,000. Between the latter date and 1896 the teachers 
increased from 5,306 to 8,988 and the average attendance of pupils 
from 188,000 to 271,000. More important still, perhaps, the standard 
of education grew better and better until the public schools were 
fully established in a position of equality with other departments of 
study and as part of a great educational chain in which the links were 
the elementary or public schools, the high schools, the normal schools 
for teachers, the Colleges and Universities. 

Sectarian higher education had, meanwhile, grown greatly in 
popularity and power in Ontario. Besides the University of Toronto 
which was secular in its control and instruction, though originally 
sectarian, and Trinity College, which was Anglican in support and 
policy; the Presbyterians had started Knox College at Toronto and 
Queen's University at Kingston — the latter a notable institution in 
the concluding quarter of the century under the control of Princi- 
pal George Monro Grant ; the Methodists founded Albert College at 



A RE VIE W OF POPULAR PROGR ESS 5 5 7 

Belleville, which, in time, joined with Victoria College of Cobourg, 
as a federated institution and later on became Victoria University of 
Toronto ; the Baptists established McMaster University in Toronto ; 
and the Roman Catholics founded, in succession, Regiopolis College 
at Kingston and the University of Ottawa at Ottawa. 

In the Maritime Provinces early conditions were very similar to 
those of Upper Canada or Ontario. There was the same poverty in 
school arrangements and paucity in teaching talent or training. There 
was the same indifference shown amongst the masses of the people 
toward elementary education and the same tendency among the rulers 
and upper classes to promote higher education and collegiate institu- 
tions. King's College at Windsor, Nova Scotia, was organized as far 
back as 1788; the University of New Brunswick was founded at 
Fredericton in the first year of the century ; Dalhousie University 
was established at Halifax under the auspices of the Earl of Dal- 
housie in 1821 ; Acadia College, Wolfville, was formed in 1838, as 
the educational centre of the Baptists and as a protest against the 
Church of England associations of all the other Colleges. Mount 
Allison College, Sackville, N. B., was founded by the Methodists in 
1843 and the Presbyterian College at Halifax in 1820. In Nova 
Scotia, the Rev. Dr. Thomas McCulloch and in New Brunswick, the 
Rev. Dr. Edwin Jacob did continuous and splendid service to this 
cause of higher education. The elementary system developed more 
slowly. Nova Scotia possessed only 217 schools and 5,514 pupils in 
1824, spent upon them less than $50,000 and voted down more than 
one measure for taxing the people in their support. In 1850, how- 
ever, Mr. (afterwards Sir) J. W. Dawson was appointed the first 
Superintendent of Education in the Province. Progress then became 
more rapid and improved methods of teaching and plans of building 
were developed. He was succeeded in 1855 t>y the Rev. Dr. Alex- 
ander Forrester and, in 1,864, the Hon. Dr. Tupper introduced in the 



558 A RE VIE W OF POPULAR PROGRESS 

Legislature of Nova Scotia his famous measure establishing free 
schools and a general public assessment for their maintenance. He 
fought the Bill through successfully but the unpopularity of the direct 
taxation involved defeated him at the ensuing elections. 

The system, however, was established and, under the succeeding 
management of the Rev. A. S. Hunt, Dr. Theodore H. Rand, Dr. David 
Allison and Dr. Alexander H. MacKay, became eminently successful. 
The number of teachers rose from 916 in 1865 to 2,438 in 1896, the 
average daily attendance of pupils from 23,572 to 53,023, the popular 
assessment for expenses from $124,000 to $450,000, the Provincial 
grant from $87,000 to $242,000. The Council of Public Instruction is 
composed of five members of the Government and the Superintendent 
of Education is a non-political administrator of the Department under 
their general control. Separate schools have never been organized in 
Nova Scotia under Provincial auspices, although the Catholics have an 
efficient system of higher education including St. Francois Xavier 
College at Antigonish and the College of Ste. Anne at Church Point. 

In New Brunswick, for many years after the beginning of the 
century, teachers' salaries remained so small and the position was so 
undignified — as a result of the universal custom in pioneer Canada 
of "boarding around" at the houses of the school patrons so as to 
eke out meagre remuneration — that good men would have nothing to 
do with the profession. As late as 1845 teachers' wages averaged $125 
a year in this Province and much of that miserable sum was not paid in 
cash. In this year, however, matters seem to have come to a head, a 
Committee of the Legislature was appointed to investigate the con- 
dition of education in the Province and two years later an effort was 
made to establish an organized system. In 1852 a Superintendent was 
appointed and in 1858 further legislation took place. But it appeared 
impossible to change the apathy and indifference of the people. 
Though they were fighting bitter sectarian contests over Universities 



A REVIEW OF POPULAR PROGRESS 559 

and Test Acts and higher education they refused to take any interest 
in, or tax themselves for, the elementary teaching of their children. 

In 1 87 1, therefore, it was decided to establish free schools and 
compulsory attendance and to, at the same time, abolish all religious 
teaching. This latter action was a distinct blow to the Catholic 
Separate Schools which had practically developed and was, of course, 
strongly resented by the people of that Church. The measure passed, 
however, and stands as greatly to the credit of the Hon. George E. 
King, then Premier of the Province and afterwards Justice of the 
Supreme Court at Ottawa, as does the preceding establishment of free 
schools in Nova Scotia to the credit of Sir Charles Tupper. The 
system is much the same as in the latter Province and has been pre- 
sided over since 1871 by Dr. Theodore H. Rand, William Crocket 
and Dr. James R. Inch. From 1872 to 1897 the number of schools 
increased from 884 to 1737, the teachers from 918 to 1829, and the 
pupils from 39,000 to 61,000. 

In little Prince Edward Island conditions were not different in 
early times from those in the larger Provinces and it was not until 
1825 that its first Education Act was passed. The year 1852 saw 
the establishment of a free school system and, in i860, the Prince of 
Wales' College was opened at Charlottetown. There were 121 
schools in 1841 and 531 in 1891 ; 4,356 pupils in the former year and 
22,138 in the latter. To sum up the situation in these Provinces it 
maybe said that everywhere prior to Confederation similar conditions 
existed and everywhere the same beneficial results have since followed 
the establishment of free schools, the formation of Normal Schools 
for the training of teachers, the taxation of the people for educational 
matters, their enforced interest in school affairs and the elevation and 
increased dignity given to the teaching profession. 

Development along these lines in the North-West and British 
Columbia was naturally an affair of comparatively recent times. 



560 A REVIEW OF POPULAR PROGRESS 

Such education as there was in earlier days came through the devoted 
activities of pioneer missionaries such as the ministers of the Red 
River Settlement, Fathers Tache and Provencher, the Rev. John 
West, the Rev. Dr. John Black, and many others who spread them- 
selves in a thin line of labour and self-sacrifice over a vast extent of 
territory stretching to the Pacific Ocean. In Manitoba the system 
since 1890 has been a free school and undenominational one. There 
were sixteen Protestant schools in 1877 and seventeen Catholic schools 
and, in 1S90, these had increased to 62S and 91 respectively. Since 
the new system was inaugurated considerable progress has been 
made and, in 1S97, there were 101 S public schools with an expendi- 
ture of $S 1 0,000. The system in the Territories includes a Council of 
Public Instruction of a somewhat mixed character and of very recent 
formation. There are four members of the Government upon the 
Council and four appointed members from outside — two Protestants 
and two Catholics. Progress has been excellent, especially in view of 
the immense areas under Territorial jurisdiction, and the schools in 
operation have increased, between 1SS6 and 1896, from 76 to 366; 
the enrolled pupils from 2.553 to 12,796; the teachers from 84 to 433 
and Legislative expenditure from $8,900 to $126,000. 

British Columbia had practically no educational system prior to 
1872. Up to that time both the earlier efforts of the Hudson's Bay 
Company on Vancouver Island and the later ones of the Legislature 
had been unsuccessful. The Public School Act of the year riien- 
tioned, however, established a defined system which was improved by 
legislation in 1879, 1891, and 1896. There is a Minister of Educa- 
tion as well as a Superintendent of Education, but the general 
character of the arrangements are not materially different from those 
in other Provinces. In 1872 there were 25 school districts which had 
increased to 193 in 1896 ; an average daily attendance of 575 as 
against one of 9.254 ; an expenditure of $36,000 as against $204,ooa 



A RE VIE W OF POPi 'L AR PROGRESS 5 (". i 

There are a large number of Indian schools in the Province under 
denominational control and. though it is without a University, 
the Roman Catholics have two Colleges for ho)s and various 
Academies, while the Methodists have a College at New Westmin- 
ster. The only University from Lake Superior to the shores of the 
Pacific is the University of Manitoba at Winnipeg. It originatctl, 
practically, from the Anglican Red River Academy of pioneer days 
and was organized in 1877 with IT niversity powers and as a federated 
institution which included St. John's College, (the old-time AcailcMH)) 
Manitoba College under Presbyterian auspices, the College of St. 
Boniface under Catholic control, and Wesley College under Metlunlist 
guidance. Archbishop Machray, the Anglican Primate of Canada, 
has been its Chancellor for many years and has had much to do with 
its history and success. 

During all these educational developments in the Provinces the 
factor of sectarian strife has had a more or less pronounced effect. 
In Quebec it took the early form of antagonism between the hier- 
archy and the founders of McGill University, but finally mellowed 
down into a condition in which Laval has become the centre 
of Catholic higher education and McGill of Protestant attendance. 
Little conflict has existed in modern times between the elementary 
school sections and they have worked quietly along their own tlis- 
tinctand marked lines. In Ontario the earlier struggles were between 
the dominant and dominating Church of England which desired 
— as in the Mother-land — to control the Universities. This desire 
led to the long political conflict over the constitution and functions of 
King's College, or, as it afterwards became, the University of 'l\)rortto. 
It also caused the formation of various denominational Colleges and 
Universities. A later struggle, in the years preceding Confederation, 
was fought over the Catholic desire for Separate Schools — a wish 
which was realized in the legislation of 1862 and chrystalized in the 



562 ' A REVIEW OF POPULAR PROGRESS 

pact of Confederation and the subsequent amendments of the 
Mowat Government. In the Maritime Provinces the struggle for 
supremacy in educational matters by the Church of England resulted 
in a division of forces and opinion which led to the foundation of 
Dalhousie University in antagonism to King's College and the creation 
of Acadia College in opposition to both. The Mount Sackville 
institution was, in the same way a New Brunswick protest against the 
original Anglicanism of its University at Fredericton. The conflicts 
were bitter and eventually went against the Church of England 
principle, but, instead of resulting in a unified system of secular 
higher education in each of the Provinces, as should logically have 
been the case, it has simply caused the multiplication of denomina- 
tional colleges at the expense of the now secularized older institutions 
and at the expense, in many cases, of general efficiency and success. 

RELIGIOUS HISTORY AND PROGRESS 

The religious progress of Canada since pioneer days is a subject 
of fascinating interest. It has worked in 'different ways into the very 
warp and woof of Canadian history and finds a place, through denomi- 
national rivalry, in almost every Canadian branch of popular develop- 
ment. In Quebec, the Roman Catholic Church has guided and modified 
and controlled the institutions of the Province, the habits and customs 
of the French race, the morals and politics and loyalty of the people. 
It helped Lord Dorchester to save the country to the Crown in 1776 ; 
it supported Great Britain with strenuous efforts in 181 2 ; it modified 
and checked the revolutionary movement of 1837; it stood by the 
proposals for Confederation in 1867; it largely backed up the Con- 
servative party in its principles of expansion and protection and rail- 
way development up to 1891 ; it opposed the movement in favour of 
Commercial Union with the United States. It had a place in the 
Jesuits Estates question, a pronounced share in the Riel issue, an 
important part in the New Brunswick School question and a still more 
vital share in the Manitoba School matter. 



A REVIEW OF POPULAR PROGRESS 563 

The Church of England in all the English Provinces was a domi- 
nant power in earlier days, an influence for loyalty to the Crown for 
education in the love of British institutions, tor adherence to rule by 
Governing Loyalist class, for devotion to the policy of BrU.sh Cover 
"nors It held ahigh place in the Government of all the Prov,nces-not 
excepting Catholic Quebec-prior to the Rebellion ; it had a strong 
interest in the stormy question of the Clergy Reserves ; .t held 
vigorous position in matters of education ; it did much, m co-operat on 
wiA the Roman Catholic Church, to pioneer Western rehg.ous acUv- 
ities • it was for half a century the Church of the classes the support of 
old-t'ime Toryism, the strength of a social system which was not wah- 
out great benefit to a new community and crude cond.uons of 1 fe 

The Methodist denomination had a pronounced place in the 
hearts of later settlers from the United States and the United Kmg- 
dol It was the early root and home of Canadian rad.cal.m, the 
centre of opposition to Toryism, the embodiment of steady and severe 
missionary labours, the cause of bitter political controversy m educa- 
Xnal matters and in such political issues as ^^ Clergy Reserves I 
held intimate associations with American Methodism and up to 181 , a 
ereatpart of its ministers were American while its polity and pnnci- 
'pCsand preaching were also American in style -d, too of^en in 

J ^ • ^lot^ After the war, when many of its puipits 
advocacy and patriotism. Alter tne wdi, 

were vaated by American citizens returning to their own country 
The English element became predominant and, in t8.8, the Canadian 
Methodist Conference was finally declared independent of the A-nen- 
can Church. It had many ups and downs after this - and -s 
divided upon political issues in later years by Dr. Egerton Ryers n 
but always, and everywhere in the Provinces, it continued to exercise 
a strong influence in pubHc affairs. 

Presbyterianism was never such a political factor as were he 
three divisions of Christianity just referred to. Its polity was too 



564 ^ REVIEW OF POPULAR PROGRESS 

severe in tone and practice and its ministers too conservative, in a 
non partisan sense, to constitute what might be termed a semi-political 
denomination. Methodism was essentially a militant and missionary de- 
nomination in Canadian history ; Presbyterianism was more of a strong, 
pervading influence among men of a single nationality. Its divisions 
were not so numerous as in the other case and, prior to the Disruption 
in Scotland, the *' Kirk " often stood side by side with the Church of 
England as a silent factor for the preservation of old traditions and in 
simple antagonism to democratic innovation. The chief political issue 
with which it was mixed up was that of the Clergy Reserves, just as 
the one public question in which the strong Baptist denomination of 
the Maritime Provinces was concerned was that of secular education. 

In all these religious divisions the controversies of the Old Land 
were reproduced with more or less fidelity. The Church of England 
disputed in the latter half of the century over forms and ceremonies 
of High or Low Church practice just as they did in England. 
Methodism was divided into the Primitive Methodist Church, the 
Bible Christian Church and the Wesleyan Methodist Church, while 
its American affiliations and Canadian position brought into existence 
the New Methodist-Episcopal Church and the Methodist New Con- 
nexion. Presbyterianism had its Church of Scotland in Canada, its 
Free Church Synod, its Presbyterian Church of the Lower Provinces, 
its United Presbyterian Church, its Canada Presbyterian Church. 

If, however, the denominations shared in the shaded differences 
of thought and creed which came to them from the Old Land, they 
-also shared, immensely and beneficially, in the financial benefactions 
of the British Churches and of the great missionary Societies ; while 
the Church of England received large sums from the British Parlia- 
ment well on into the nineteenth century. Up to 1833, when a gradual 
reduction was begun, the Imperial Parliament granted ^16,000 a year 
for the maintenance of this Church in British America and many 



A REVIEW OF POPULAR PROGRESS 567 

Other sums were paid from time to time. The Society for Promoting 
Christian Knowledge was indefatigable in its missionary work and 
spent large sums in extending the Episcopate, endowing missionary 
clergy, and aiding struggling parishes in the different Provinces. The 
Society for Propagating the Gospel was more than a benefactor, it 
was almost the parent of the Church of England in Canada. Its 
expenditure- between 1703 and 1892 in British America was $8,930,-' 
925 and from 1820 to 1865 its annual expenditure seldom went below 
$100,000. The Church Missionary Society was another staunch sup- 
porter of Anglicanism in Canada. The various Methodist Churches 
were also largely aided by funds from London and their early English 
missionaries were almost entirely supported from that source. So 
with the Presbyterian denominations and the well-known Glasgow 
Colonial Society and its practical work between 1825 and 1840. 

The progress 2.nA personnel of these Churches have a most inter- 
esting record — the former because of the light it throws upon general 
religious conditions, the latter because of the Influence it had upon 
public development and affairs. The Roman Catholic Church holds 
the chief place in numbers as well as in length of historic association 
with Canadian soil. As the French population of Quebec has 
increased, so have its adherents, and with this increase has come a 
similar expansion and expression of missionary zeal in the far West 
and in all the Provinces. The Catholic population of Quebec in 1783 
has been placed at 113,000 by the Church itself. In 1830 it was atl 
least half a million, with about 50,000 in Upper Canada. In 1851, 
the Church had 746,854 adherents in Lower Canada ; in 1871, just 
after Confederation, it had 1,019,850; and in 1891 1,291,709. In 
Ontario, its adherents numbered in the years mentioned 167,695, 274,- 
166 and 358,300 respectively. In the three Maritime Provinces of 
Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island it had, at 



5^8 A REVIEW OF POPULAR PROGRESS 

nearly the same periods* 181,561, 238,459 and 286,250 adherents. 
The Western figures are of recent date and show that in Manitoba, 
the Territories and British Columbia the total Catholic population in 
1881 was 26,000 in round numbers, and, in 1891, 53,000. This gives a 
round total, for what is now the Dominion, of 1,080,000 Roman Catho- 
lics in 1851, 1,530,000 in 1871, and 2,000,000 in 1891 — an increase of 
half a million in every two decades. 

The leaders of the Church during this period have had much to 
do with its success. In Quebec the militant Laval and loyal Plessis 
were succeeded by a series of eminent men of whom Archbishops 
Turgeon and Baillargeon of Quebec, Cardinal Taschereau, the first 
Canadian Prince of his Church, and Archbishops Bourget and Fabre 
of Montreal, were perhaps the chief. Bishop Guigues of Ottawa, 
Mgr. Provencher and Archbishop Tache of Manitoba, Archbishops 
Lynch and Walsh of Toronto, Archbishop Cleary of Kingston, Arch- 
bishops Connolly and O'Brien of Halifax, Mgr. McKinnon of Anti- 
gonish, and Bishop Demers of Vancouver Island, were the most repre- 
sentative successors of Macdonell and Burke and others of pioneer 
days. An important incident of ecclesiastical history in Canada in 
this connection has been the influence exercised by the Pope, at times, 
over its affairs. In 1877 Mgr. George Conroy was sent out to the 
Dominion as an Apostolic Ablegate to arrange the long-standing dis- 
putes between Laval University, in Quebec, and its branch in Mont- 
real, In 1888, Mgr. Smueldres was despatched, largely in connection 
with the same troubles and partly to soothe certain Diocesan difTficul- 
ties. Mgr. Raffaele Merry del Val was sent in 1897 to report upon 
the Manitoba School question and to prevent further agitation 
amongst the hierarchy if it should seem desirable. In 1899, Mgi*- 
Diomede Faiconio was appointed in a more permanent capacity to 
act, apparently, as the Pope's adviser upon Canadian affairs. 

* The earliest figures obtainable in New Brunswick are for 1861 and in Prince Edward Island, for 1848 This state- 
ment also applies to the statistics given at the end of this chapter 



A REVIEW OF POPULAR PROGRESS 569 

Meanwhile, the great Protestant denominations had been expand- 
ing in various directions under the most strenuous exertions by their 
leaders. The Church of England was led in Quebec by such heroes 
of the missionary field as Bishop Jacob Mountain, Bishop George J. 
Mountain and Bishop Charles James Stewart and by such religious 
organizers as Dr. Williams and Dr. Fulford — the latter the first 
j Metropolitan of Canada. In Ontario, the Rev. Dr. John Stuart and the 
strenuous personality of Bishop Strachan, were prominent. In the 
Maritime Provinces, Dr. Charles Inglis, the first Colonial Bishop 
and whose See for a time included all British America, Dr. John 
Inglis, also Bishop of Nova Scotia, Dr. Hibbert Binney, Bishop of 
the same Province, and Dr. John Medley, Bishop of Fredericton 
during forty-seven years, worked steadily in the foundation and devel- 
opment of the Church. So with Bishop Anderson and Archbishop 
Machray at Fort Garry and Winnipeg, Bishop Horden in the far- 
away Territories, Bishop Sillitoe in British Columbia and Bishop 
Bompas in the distant Yukon. 

Methodism in Canada boasts pioneer labourers such as William 
Case, James Richardson, Henry Ryan, John Reynolds, John Davison, 
Egerton Ryerson, John Carroll, Anson Green, William Black— men 
of immense energy, deep spiritual enthusiam and the highest powers 
of endurance. In later and quieter days the Church — which became one 
great united body from ocean to ocean in 1883 — boasted scholars 
and orators such as Dr. Mathew Richey, Dr. Enoch Wood, Dr. Wil- 
liam Morley Punshon, Dr. George Douglas, Dr. S. D. Rice, Dr. J. A. 
Williams, Dr. Albert Carman, Dr. W. H. Withrovv. Presbyterianism in 
its personnel has hardly had the same pioneer variety of attainment, 
except in the cases of Dr. James McGregor in Nova Scotia, Dr. John 
Cook in Quebec and Dr. John Black in the far West. In later days men 
of great ability or learning such as Dr. Alexander Mathieson, Dr. 
Robert Burns, Dr. Alexander Topp, Dr. John Jenkins, Dr. William 



570 A REVIEW OF POPULAR PROGRESS 

ReicI, Dr. William Gregg, Dr. J. M. King, Dr. William Caven and Dr. 
Alexander MacKnight appeared on the scene. The actual and statis- 
tical progress of these three great Churches since missionary days can 
be seen at a glance from the following three tables : 

I. THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND 

1851 1871 189I j 

Ontario 223,190 .... 33o>995 .... 385.999 j 

Quebec 44,682 .... 62,449 .... 75,472 

Maritime Provinces . 85,421 .... 107,844 .... 114.151 

353,293 501,288 575,622 

The Western Provinces increased from 25,000 Anglican adher- 
ents in 1 88 1 to 68,000 in 1891. 

II. THE METHODIST DENOMINATION 

1851 1871 1891 

Ontario 213,365 .... 462,264 .... 654,033 

Quebec 21,199 . ^ . . 34,ioo .... 39,544 

Maritime Provinces . 54,164 .... 81,797 .... 103,295 

288,728 578,161 796,872 

The Western figures were 13,000 in 1881 and 51,000 in 189I. 

III. PRESBYTERIANISM 

1851 1871 189I 

Ontario 204,148 . . . .356,442 . • . .453,U7 

Quebec 33,47° .... 46,165 .... 52,673 

Maritime Provinces . 129,158 .... 171,97° . . • . 182,483 

366,776 574,577 688,303 

The increase in the West was from 19,000 in 1881 to 67,000 m 
1 89 1. From these and preceding figures it is seen that, in round 
numbers, the Roman Catholic faith increased its adherents in all the 
Canadian Provinces between 1851 and 1891, by 1,000,000 souls, the 
Church of England by 290,000, the Methodist denomination by 460,- 
000, and the Presbyterian Church by 388,000. 

[This interesting chapter is contributed by J. Castell Hopkins. F.S.S., from his "Story of the Dominion."] 



EXPLANATORY INDEX 



GIVING THE NAMES OF OVER ONE HUNDRED DISTINGUISHED 
PERSONS APPEARING IN THIS VOLUME AND ALSO THE 
LEADING EVENTS IN THE BUILDING OF CANADA . . . 



Abbott, Sir J. J. C. 

Birthplace in St. Andrews, P.O. 419 
Enters a Mercantile House . . 420 
Enters McGill College .... 420 

^ Studies Law and enters Politics 420 
A Member of the Legislature . 420 
Becomes Solicitor- General . . 421 
Sent to England .... ... 427 

Interest in the Pacific Railway 428 
Elected Mayor of Montreal . . 429 
President of the Council . . . 430 
Prime Minister of Canada . . 430 
Knighted by the Queen in 1S92 431 
His Death in 1893 431 

Albert College, Founded by the 
Methodists at Belleville . . . 557 

Amherst, General, in Command 
of the Army against Louisburg 132 

Annahotaha,Etienne, joins Adam 
Daulac in his Expedition against 
the Iroquois 61 

Baldwin, Hon.Robt., as a Leader 547 

Black, Rev. Dr. John, Labor for 
Education in the Northwest . 560 

Boscawen, General, in the Expe- 
dition against Louisburg ... 132 

Bowell, Sir Mackenzie 

A Native of England .... 442 
His Father Emigrates to Canada 442 
Apprenticed to a Printer , . . 442 

Becomes a Teacher 443 

Purchases the Intelligencer . . 444 
Beginning of Political Career . 447 

30 



Visits British Columbia . . . 447 
The First Dominion Parliament 448 
Becomes Leader of the Senate 449 
Called to Premiership .... 449 
As a Volunteer and as an 
Orangeman 450 

Brant, Joseph 

A Friend of the English ... 194 
At the Attack on Crown Point 194 
Expedition against Niagara . 194 
Educated at Lebanon, Conn. . 198 
Translates the Gospel of St. 
Mark into the Mohawk language 199 
War Chief of the Six Nations . 199 

Visits England 199 

Joins the British forces .... 199 

In Border Raids 201 

Again visits England .... 201 
The Friendship between Brant 
and Governor Simcoe .... 203 
Good Influence on the Indians 203 

Brevoeuf , P e r e , Accompanies 
Champlain to the New World 50 
A Missionary to the Hurons . 51 
His Effort to Found a Mission 
in the Neutral Nation .... 54 
Slain by the Iroquois .... 54 

Brock, General Isaac 

Active Service in Holland . . 204 
With Nelson before Copenhagen 204 

Comes to Canada 204 

Sent to Upper Canada .... 207 

War Declared 207 

571 



572 



EXPLANATORY INDEX 



Brock Attacks Hull at Detroit 209 

Hull's Surrender 209 

Battle of Queenstown Heights 209 
Brock Killed in the Battle . . 211 
Knighted on the day of his Death 2 1 1 

Brown, Hon. George 

The Uncrowned King .... 348 
Founds The Globe ..... 350 
Makes an Knemy of Dr. Eger- 

ton Ryerson 351 

Makes Enemies of the Roman 

Catholics 357 

Elected to the Assembly . . . 358 
Advocate of Free Trade . . . 359 
One of the Great Fathers of 

Confederation 362 

Defeated in South Oxford . . 364 
Declines Knighthood .... 364 
His Assassination 364 

Buller, Charles, Renders valu- 
able Assistance to L,ord Dur- 
ham 297 

Burgoyne, appointed to Supreme 
Military Command in Canada . 171 

Campbell, Alexander, L,ieutenant 
Governor of Ontario .... 369 

Carleton, Guy 

A Favorite with Wolfe ... 159 
Governor-General of Canada . 1 60 
His Policy in Canada .... 160 
The Quebec Act Passed ... 161 

Hastens to Quebec 1 63 

Siege of Quebec ...... 167 

Americans Driven from Canada 171 
Advances against Americans . 171 
Governor Carleton Resigns . . 171 
Knighted by the King . ... 172 

Again Governor of Canada . . 172 
His Firmness and Wisdom . . 172 
Accused of Favoring the French 173 

Leaves Canada 173 

Influence on Future of Canada 173 

Cartier, Sir George Etienne 

His Ancestr}^ 340 

Studies Law in Montreal ... 341 

Sides with Papineau 341 

Appointed Provincial Secretary 341 

Visits England in the Interests 

of a Federal Union ..... 342 



Entrusted with the Formation 

of a Government 342 

Attorney- General 342 

Member of the Colonial Confer- 
ence, London 343 

Promoting the Construction of 
the Grand Trunk Railway and 
the Victoria Bridge 343 

Cartier, Jacques 

First Voyage to the New World i 
Arrival at Cape Bonavista . . 2 
Takes Possession in the Name 
of the King of France .... 3 
His Return to Brittany .... 4 
His Second Expedition ... 4 
Lands on the Island of Orleans 5 
Welcomed by Donnacona and 

his Followers 6 

Ascends the St. Lawrence . . 8 
First Winter in the New World 13 

Returns to France 14 

His Third Voyage 15 

Attempts to Establish a Colony 

at Cape Rouge 16 

Returns to France 16 

His Death in 1557 17 

Cartwright, Richard 

A Legislative Councillor ... 183 
One of the Leading Men in 

Upper Canada 264 

His Interest in John Strachan 264 
His Oratory 550 

Case, William, Pioneer Methodist 569 

Catholics, their Educational 
Strength and Efficiency ... 551 

Chamberlain, Joseph, his Inter- 
est in Canada 549 

Champlain, Samuel de 

His Visit to the West Indies . 18 

Sent to New France 21 

Ascends the St. Lawrence . . 21 

Returns to France 22 

Makes a Second Voyage to the 

New World 24 

Establishes a Colony at Quebec 35 
Fight with the Iroquois ... 39 
Founds a Settlement at Montreal 4 1 
Enters Lake Huron and Lake 
Qntarip ...,,..,,, 44 



EXPLANATORY INDEX 



57S 



Wounded in Battle 49 

Taken Prisoner to England . . 49 
His Death Christmas Day, 1635 49 
Chapleau, Sir Adolphe, his long 

Career in Politics at Quebec . 55° 
Chaveau, Hon. P. J. O., Distin- 
guished Educator 552 

Colborne, John, left in Charge of 

Affairs ,: 299 

Conroy, Mgr. George, Apostolic 

Ablegate .' 568 

Cook, Dr.John, a Religious Leader 

in Quebec 569 

Courcelies, M. de. Undertakes to 

Explore the Upper St. Lawrence 7 1 
Crooks, Hon. Adam, Directs the 

Education Department . . • 554 
Cunard, Sir Samuel, Founder of 

the Cunard Line of Steamers . 249 
Daulac, Adam 

Attacks the Iroquois 59 

Ascends the Ottawa 60 

Attack by the Iroquois on the 

"LongSaut" - 64 

His Defeat and Death .... 08 
Effect on the Iroquois .... 69 
Dauversiere, Jerome le Royer de 

la. Portrait of 39 

Dawson, Sir J. W. 

Head of McGill University . . 552 
Superintendent of Edvication . 557 
De Chastes sends Champlain to 

New France '^•^ 

De Levis, Francois Dtx, at the 

Battle of Quebec 160 

Portrait of -^ 

Denonville, Marquis de 

Governor of New France . . 107 
His Treachery to the Indians . 107 
Dorion, Sir Antoine A., K. N.T., 
a Distinguished French-Canad- 
ian 547 

Draper, William Henry, Promi- 
nent in English Public Life . . 544 

Durham, Lord 

Early Life and Education . . 2S9 

Minister to St. Petersburg . . 290 

Affairs in the Provinces ... 294 



PAGB 
297 
297 
298 
299 
301 
301 



His Arrival in Quebec . . . 
His Treatment of the Rebels 
He Returns to England . . 
His Celebrated Report .... 
The Influence of his Report . 

His Early Death 

Elgin, Lord 

His Distinguished Ancestry . 
Studies at Christ Church, Oxford 
Appointed Governor- General of 
British North America .... 
His Attitude on the Rebellion 
His Course Approved .... 
Reconciles many Thousands of 
French to English Rule . . . 
His Farewell to Canada , . . 

Sent to China 

Offered the Office of Postmas- 
ter-General in England . . 
Again Sent to China . . • 
Appointed Viceroy of India 

His Death ■ • ■ 

A Great Empire Builder . . 
Faiconio, Mgr., Apostolic Dele- 
gate • ■ 

Fielding, William Stevens, Sub- 
mits a New Fiscal Policy for 

the Dominion 

Foster, Hon. George E., Elo- 
quence in Debate 

Frontenac, Count de 

Early Life 

Governor in New France . . . 
Convokes the Three Estates in 

Quebec 

His Admiration of La Salle . . 
Succeeded by La Barre . . . 
Again made Governor .... 
His Invasion of the English 

Colonies : 

Defeats the Expedition of Sir 
William Phips against Quebec 
The King's Recognition of his 

Services 

His Death 

Gait, Sir Alexander T., Invited 
to Form a Ministry .... 
Helps to make the Confedera- 
tion 



320 
320 

322 
324 
327 

328 
331 
331 

333 
333 
337 
338 
339 

568 



532 

550 

99 

lOI 

102 
104 
104 
108 

109 

120 

122 
127 

378 
380 



574 



EXPLAKATOilY INDEX 



Gladstone, William E., his Im- 
press on Canada 548 

Grant, George Monro, Head of 

Queen's University 554 

His Kstiniate of Joseph Howe 232 

Qourlay, Robert, Initiates the Ke- 
form Movement in Canada . . 268 

lialiburton, Thomas Chandler 

A Noted 'Writer ... ... 220 

Called to the Bar 220 

In the Nova Scotia House . . 220 
His Plea for the Abolition of 

the Test Oath 220 

Censured by the Assembly . . 220 

Succeeds his Father as Judge . 221 

His Residence in Kngland . . 221 

In the House of Commons . . 221 

His Literary Work . . . . 222 

"Sam Slick" 228 

The Founder of the American 

School of Humor 230 

His Achievements 231 

Hennepin, P"" re, accompanies La 
Salle to New France .... 81 
The First European to Look 
upon Niagara Falls 82 

Hickson, Sir Joseph 

Comes to Canada 473 

General Manager of the Grand 

Trunk 474 

Knighted for his Good Work . 474 
His Connection with the St. 

Clair Tunnel 475 

President of the Royal Commis- 
sion on the Prohibition of the 

Liquor Traffic 475 

His Death in 1897 475 

Howe, Hon. Joseph 

A Representative of the Masses 232 

His Influence on the People . 233 

Purchases the ,Nova Scotian . 238 

Indicted for Libel 240 

Elected to the Assembly ... 241 
The Great Battle for a Respon- 
sible Government 242 

His Brilliant Eight Hour Speech 243 

In a Duel 247 



His Work for Railway and 

Steamship Facilities 249 

Attitude toward Confederation 250 
His Great Detroit Speech . . 251 
Becomes Secretary of State . . 250 
Lieutenant-Governor of Nova 

Scotia 251 

His Death 251 

Hunt, Rev. A. S., Prominent in 
Education in Nova Scotia . . 558 

Huntington, L. S., his Connection 
with the Pacific Railway , . . 383 
Portrait of 416 

Inglis, Dr. John, Bishop of Nova 
Scotia 569 

Jacob, Dr. Edwin, Distinguished 
Educator of New Brunswick . 557 

Johnson, General William, At- 
tack on Crown Point .... 194 
The French at Niagara Surren- 
der to Him 197 

Joliet and Marquette Discover 
the Mississippi 80 

King, Hon. George E., Premier 
of New Brunswick ..... 559 

Knox College, Toronto .... 554 

LaFontaine, Sir L. H. , a Distin- 
guished French Canadian . . 547 

LaBarre, Lefebvre de la. Succes- 
sor to Frontenac as Governor 

of New France 93 

His Enmity to LaSalle ... 93 
Failure of his Expedition 

Against the Indians 107 

His Recall „ 107 

LaMotte Accompanies La Salle to 
the New World 82 

La 5alle, Robert de 

Arrival in Canada 72 

Receives a Land Grant . . <> 73 
Discovers the Ohio River ... 74 

Returns to Quebec 74 

Frontenac his Friend and Ally 74 
Idea of a Waterway to the 

Southern Sea 80 

Lays his Proj ect before the King 8 1 
Returns to Canada and Rebuilds 
Fort Frontenac 82 



EXPLANATORY INDEX 



575 



Builds the "Griffin" .... 84 

Knters Lake Huron 84 

Loss of the "Griffin" .... 89 
His Search for Tonti .... 91 
Reaches the Mouth of the Mis- 
sissippi 92 

Builds Fort St. Louis .... 92 
Again goes to France .... 93 
Sets Sail for the Gulf of Mexico 94 
Sufferings of the Expedition . 97 
Murdered by one of his Men . 98 
Laurier, Hon. Sir Wilfrid 

Born in St. Lin, Quebec . . . 525 

Called to the Bar 526 

Enters the Quebec Legislature 526 
A Brilliant Orator .... 526 
His Entry into the House of 

Commons 527 

Minister of Inland Revenue . 528 
Leader of the Liberal Party . . 531 
Prime Minister and President 
of the Privy Council . . . . 532 
The Queen 's Diamond Jubilee . 532 

His Foreign Policy 533 

Knighted; a Member of the Im- 
perial Privy Council 533 

His Loyal Action during the 

South African War 534 

The Coronation of Edward VII 534 
Characteristics of his Oratory . 537 

His Personality 538 

His Toast "Our Guests the 

Colonial Premiers" 539 

As an Opportunist in Politics . 550 

Laval, Pioneer Bishop of Quebec 568 

Opposition to Frontenac ... 103 

Leaders, Canadian Political . . 544 

Louisburg, Siege of 134 

Loyalists, as a Party 542 

McCulloch, Rev. Dr. Thomas, a 
Distinguished Educator of 

Nova Scotia 557 

McQill, Hon. James, his Gift for 

a University in Montreal . . . 268 
McGregor, Dr. James, Pioneer 

Presbyterian in Nova Scotia . 569 
McMaster University, Founded 
by the Baptists 557 



• . • 544 
Sir John A. 



369 
370 

37 ' 
37- 



373 
381 
381 
381 

382 
382 
384 
384 



McNab, Sir Allan N., the Tory 

Leader 

Macdonald, the Rt. Hon 

Born in Glasgow 368 

His Parents Move to Upper 

Canada 369 

Chooses Law as a Profession . 
Enters Political Life as a Tory 
Appointed Receiver-General in 

1S47 

Opposes Rebellion Losses Bill 
Finds an Effective Ally in Hon. 

George Brown 372 

Formation of the Liberal-Con- 
servative Party 

A Leader in the Confederation 
Receives Knighthood .... 
First Premier of Canada . . . 
One of the Imperial Commis- 
sioners to the United States . . 
An Imperial Privy Councillor 
Resignation from the Ministry 
Once More in Power .... 
His Last Great Triumph and 

his Death 389 

A Summing up of his Services 390 
His Contribution to Popular 
Progress 549 

Machray, Archbishop, Anglican 

Primate of Canada 561 

Work at Fort Garry 569 

Mackenzie, Hon. Alexander 

Early Life in Scotland .... 392 
Becomes a Stone Mason . . . 393 
Determines to go to Canada . 394 
Settles on a Farm near Kingston 397 
Returns to Kingston as a Mason 399 
Enters Political Life .... 400 
Editor of the Lambton Shield . 401 
Elected to Parliament .... 402 
Advocates Vigorous Policy in 

Rebellion of 1870 408 

Provincial Treasurer of Upper 

Canada 408 

The Pacific Scandal 409 

His Career as Premier . . . . 410 

Visits Scotland 412 

Defeated in 1878 414 

His Death 418 



57a 



EXPLANATORY INDEX 



Macke»i7ie, Wm. Lyon, Denoun- 
ces Dr. Kyersoii ...... 281 

Maisonneuve, the Frencli Gov- 
ernor 59 

Marquette and Joliet Discover 
the Mississippi 80 

Medley, Dr. John, Bishop of 
Fredericton 569 

Meilleur, Dr. Jean Baptiste, his 
"Work for Kducation 552 

Merritt, Hon. William Hamilton 
A United Empire Loyalist . . 253 
His Father Attracted to Upper 

Canada 254 

Visits the Bermudas 257 

His Scheme for the V/elland 

Canal 258 

The Welland Canal Opened . 260 

His Political Life 261 

His Death 261 

Merry del Val, Mgr., Visits Do- 
minion 568 

Montcalm Commands the French 
Opposing Wolfe at Quebec . 139 
His Death 157 

Monts, Sieur de, made Lieuten- 
ant-General in Acadie .... 22 
Makes a Settlement at St. Croix 24 
The Colonists Move to Port 
Royal 28 

Mountain, Bishop Jacob, a Hero 
of Missionary Work 569 

Mowat, Sir Oliver, Premier of 

Ontario 369 

Rare Qualities of Tact .... 549 

Parties, Evolution of 542 

Phips, Sir William, and Fron- 
tenac 112-117 

Plessis, his Work at Quebec . . 568 

Poutrincourt, Baron of, Accom- 
panies De Monts 24 

Returns to France 25 

Sails from Rochelle 28 

Arrives at Port Royal .... 31 

Progress, A Review of Popular . 541 

Protestant Schools .... 551-562 
Churches 562-570 

Rebellion of 1837 543 



Riel, Louis, his Rebellion . . 492-512 
His Connection with Dr. Schultz 438 

Arrested 491 

His Execution and Sir John 

Thompson's Speech 438 

As an Issue in Religious His- 
tory , 562 

Roberval, Sieur de, made Gov- 
ernor 15 

His Arrival at St. John's, New- 
foundland 16 

Robinson, Sir John Beverley 

Educated by John Strachan . . 314 
Begins the Study of Law . . . 317 
Attorney-General of Upper 

Canada 317 

In the War of 1812 . . . . . 317 
An Important Mission to Great 

Britain 317 

Chief Justice of Upper Canada 318 
Declines Knighthood .... 318 
Made a Companion of the Bath 318 

Death in 1863 . 318 

An Early Leader of Canada . 544 

Ross, Hon. George W., Head of 
the Education Department . . 554 

Ryerson, Dr. Egerton 

Of United Empire Loyalist 

Stock , 274 

His Father receives a Grant of 
Land in Upper Canada . . . 277 
Joins the Methodist Communion 278 
A Missionary to the Indians . 279 
Controversy with Archdeacon 

Strachan 279 

H i s Attitude Towards t h ,e 

Church of England 280 

Goes to England 280 

Denounced by Wm. Lyon Mac- 
kenzie 281 

Principal of Victoria College . 284 
Superintendent of Public 
Schools in Upper Canada . . 284 
His History of the Loyalists of 

America 287 

The Modern Organizer of the 

Public School 553 

Head of Education Department 554 
Pioneer in Methodism . . . . 569 



EXPLANATORY 



476 
476 

479 
479 
480 



Salisbury, Lord, Interest in Can- 
ada 

Saunders, Admiral, in Command 

of Wolfe's Fleet 

Schultz, Sir John C. 

Early Life in Ontario • • • •, 
Graduated from Queen's Uni- 
versity 

His Newspaper Work . . . • 
Imprisoned by Riel's Orders . 
His Escape to Canada .... 
Is Elected to the Canadian Par- 
liament • • : 480 

Lieutenant-Governor of Mani- 
toba .-481 

His Death in Monterey, Mexico 481 
Sewall, Jonathan, an Early Polit- 
ical Leader 

Simcoe, John Graves 

His Father Killed at Siege of 

Quebec 

Earlv Education • 

Wins Distinction at the Battle 

of Brandywine • 

His Work among the Loyalists 178 
At the Surrender of Yorktown 179 

Enters Parliament 181 

Made Governor of Upper 

Canada / ^^^ 

Opens his first Parliament m 

Upper Canada 183 

The Loyalists his Favorite Sub 



544 



174 
177 

177 



jects 

Welcomed by Joseph Brant 



184 
187 
190 



His Diplomacy • • 

Appointed Governor of San 
Domingo . . . . • • • • • 
Made Lieutenant- General in the 

British Army 

His Death 

Smith, Goldwin, on the Confed- 
eration 

Stephen, Lord Hount 520 

Stewart, Bishop Charles James, 
a Great Missionary 569 

Strachan, Bishop John 

Qf Scotch Parentage 263 



190 

191 
191 

363 



Fi77 

INDEX "" ' 

PAGE 

A Graduate of the University of 

Aberdeen 263 

Is Offered a Position in Upper 

Canada ; V "^"^ 

Takes Orders in the Church of 

England ^64 

His Removal to York . . . . 20» 

The War of 1812 • 268 

Member of Executive Council 268 

Visits England 269 

His Work for Education ... 269 

King's College Opened . ... 272 

Trinity College Opened ... 273 

The Closing Years of his Life . 273 

Interest in Canadian Politics . 544 

As Pioneer of Education . . . 553 

Strenuous Personality of . . • 569 
Strathcona, Lord 

Born at Forres, Scotland ... 482 
Reaches Canada during the War 

of 1837 • • : 

Sent to the Labrador Depart- 
ment of the Company . . • -486 
Promotion after Many Years of 

Hardship .; -.t: ^ 

Commissioner to the Wortti- 

West .;.••• 49^ 

Beginning of Political Career . 5^9 
Elected to the Dominion Parlia- 
ment i-T J " i 

Made Governor of the Hudson s 
Bay Company ....••• 520 
High Commissioner for Canada 521 
Made a Peer of the Realm . . 521 
His Work during the War m 

South Africa 522 

Sydenham, Lord 

The son of an English Merchant 302 
Begins Business Life in St. 

Petersburg -302 

His Extensive Travels on the 

Continent "^ " ; ' ^^^ 

Attitude towards Free Trade . 304 
Vice-President of the Board of ^ 

'j^j-ade ^°'^ 

Governor-General of the British 

Provinces / x^ ^^^ 

His Work for the Union of the 
Provinces 309 



578 



EXPLANATORY INDEX 



Deals with the Clergy Reserves 

Question 309 

Created Baron Sydenham . . 310 
The Union Proclaimed ... 310 
Meets with a Fatal Accident . 311 

His Death 312 

His Work for England and 
Canada 313 

Tache, Sir E. P., Forms a Min- 
istry . . 379 

A I^eader in Popular Progress . 547 

Taschereau, Cardinal, his Emi- 
nence in Church Affairs ... 568 

Tecum seh 

A Bitter Enemy of the United 

States 212 

Aims to Form a Mighty Indian 

Confederacy 213 

Tecumseh joins the British in 

the War of 1 8 1 2 213 

Pen Picture of Tecumseh . . . 214 
With Brock at Capture of 

Detroit 217 

Tecumseh with Proctor . , . 218 
His Death 219 

Thompson, S r John 

A Native of Halifax 432 

His Early Education .... 432 

Called to the Bar 433 

Elected to Provincial House of 

Assembly 433 

Attorney- General of Province 434 
Appointed Judge of the Supreme 
Court of Nova Scotia .... 434 
Minister of Justice ..... 438 
His Speech on the Execution 

of Louis Riel 438 

Knighted 439 

Succeeds Abbott as Premier . 440 

His Death 441 

Reputation for Political integ- 
rity 549 

Tilley, Sir Leonard, Introduces 
Tariff known as the National 

Policy 388 

His Personal Honor 549 

Tonli, Henry de, a Faithful Fol- 
lower of EaSalle 82 



Tupper, Sir Charles 

A Native of Nova Scotia . . . 454 
Receives the Degree of M.D. . 454 
Practices Medicine in Nova 

Scotia 454 

Appointed Provincial Secretary 457 
Becomes Premier of Nova Scotia 45 8 
His Part in Confederation . . 459 
President of the Privy Council 461 
First Dominion Minister of 
Railways and Canals .... 461 
High Commissioner of Canada 

in London 463 

Returns to Canada as Minister 

of Finance 463 

Again in London 463 

Becomes Premier ...... 468 

The Manitoba School Question 468 
Resigns the Premiership . . . 469 

His Public Honors 469 

A Consistent Political Career . 550 
Introduces his Famous Measure 
for Free Schools in Nova Scotia 558 

University of Toronto .... 554 

West, Re\. John, his Work in 
the Northwest 560 

Wolfe, General James 

His Birthplace and Early Life 128 
Active Military Life begins in 

Flanders 129 

At the Battles of Falkirk and 

Culloden Moor 130 

Failure of Expedition against 

Rochefort 131 

Saili for America against Louis: 

burg and Quebec 132 

Leads the Landing Party at 

Louisburg 133 

Fall of Louisburg 137 

Made Commander-in-Chief of 
Expedition against Quebec . . 138 
Lands his Forces on the Island 
of Orleans below Quebec . . . 141 
The Siege of Quebec Begins . 142 
Scales the Rock of Quebec . . 152 
Defeat of the French under 

Montcalm 154 

His Death 157 



28 liO^- 



